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UNIFORM EDITION 



GOUVERNEUR MORRIS 

The Story of His Life and Work 



By 

THEODORE ROOSEVELT 



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PHILADELPHIA 

GEBBIE AND COMPANY 
1903 



THt LIBRARY OF 

APR 22 1903 

Copyright Entry 
CLASS ft' xXc. No 

COPY b; 



Copyright, i888 

Copyright, 1898 

by 

THEODORE ROOSEVELT 



Copyright, 1898 
Copyright, 1903 

by 

HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY 



This ed'tionqf " Gouyerneur Morris" is issued under special 
arra-jige/»entj/ith,<fIoUG^TON, MirtuN^AND Company 



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PREFACE 



GOUVERNEUR MORRIS, like his far greater 
friend and political associate, Alexander 
Hamilton, had about him that "touch of 
the purple" which is always so strongly attractive. 
He was too unstable and erratic to leave a pro- 
found mark upon our political developments, but 
he performed two or three conspicuous feats, he 
rendered several marked services to the country, 
and he embodied to a peculiar degree both the 
qualities which made the Federalist party so bril- 
liant and so useful, and those other qualities v/hich 
finally brought about its downfall. Hamilton and 
even Jay represented better what was highest in 
the Federalist party. Gouvemeur Morris stood 
for its weakness as well as for its strength. Able, 
fearless, and cultivated, deeply devoted to his 
people, and of much too tough fiber ever to be 
misled into losing his affection for things Amer- 
ican because of American faults and shortcomings, 
as was and is the case with weaker natures, he was 
able to render distinguished service to his country. 
Other American ministers have been greater and 
more successful diplomats than Morris was; but 

iii 



IV 



Preface 



no one has better represented those qualities of 
generous daring and lofty disinterestedness which 
we like to associate with the name American, than 
did the minister who, alone among the foreign 
ministers, kept his residence in Paris through the 
"Terror." He stood for order. He stood for the 
honest payment of debts. Unlike many of his 
colleagues, he was a polished man of the world, 
whose comments on men and things showed that 
curious insight and power of observation which 
come only when to natural ability there is added 
special training. But he distrusted the mass of 
the people, and especially the mass of the people 
in other sections of the coimtry than his own, who 
had not the habits of refinement and the ways of 
looking at life which he and his associates pos- 
sessed ; and thus it happened that, when the Fed- 
eralists sank into a secessionist faction, the name 
of Gouvemeur Morris was associated with the 
names of the others who at that time lacked the 
power, but not the will, to split a great nation into 
a chaos of feeble and quarrelsome little states. 

Washington, April, 1898. 



CONTENTS 



CHAPTER I 
His Youth: Colonial New York i 



CHAPTER II 
The Outbreak of the Revolution: Morris in the 

Provincial Congress 26 

CHAPTER III 
Independence: Forming the State Constitution ... 50 

CHAPTER IV 
In the Continental Congress 72 

CHAPTER V 
Finances: The Treaty of Peace 94 

CHAPTER VI 
The Formation of the National Constitution ... 118 

CHAPTER VII 
First Stay in France 159 

CHAPTER VIII 
Life in Paris 185 

CHAPTER IX 
Mission to England: Return to Paris 213 

V 



vi Contents 

CHAPTER X PAGE 

Minister to France 236 

CHAPTER XI 
Stay in Europe 281 

CHAPTER XII 
Service in the United States Senate 300 

CHAPTER XIII 

The Northern Disunion Movement among the Fed- 
eralists 325 

Index 343 



ILLUSTRATIONS 



GouvERNEUR MoRRis . . . Frontispiece 
From an Etching made in 1783 

George Clinton ...... 64 

From an Etching by J. B. Forest 

Alexander Hamilton ..... 156 ^ 
From an Etching by H. B. Hall 

John Jay ....... 282 

From an Etching made in 1783 



vu 



GOUVERNEUR MORRIS 



CHAPTER I. 

HIS youth: colonial new YORK. 

WHEN on January 31, 1752, Gouvemeur 
Moms was bom in the family manor- 
house at Morrisania, on the lands where 
his forefathers had dwelt for three generations, 
New York colony contained only some eighty 
thousand inhabitants, of whom twelve thousand 
were blacks. New York city was a thriving little 
trading town, whose people in summer suffered 
much from the mosquitoes that came back with 
the cows when they were driven home at nightfall 
for milking; while from among the locusts and 
water-beeches that lined the pleasant, quiet 
streets, the tree-frogs sang so shrilly through the 
long, hot evenings that a man in speaking could 
hardly make himself heard. 

Gouvemeur Morris belonged by birth to that 
powerful landed aristocracy whose rule was known 
by New York alone among all the northern 



2 Gouverneur Morris 

colonies. His great-grandfather, who had served in 
the Cromwellian armies, came to the seaport at the 
mouth of the Hudson, while it was still beneath 
the sway of Holland, and settled outside of Haer- 
lem, the estate being invested with manorial privi- 
leges by the original grant of the governor. In the 
next two generations the Morrises had played a 
prominent part in colonial affairs, both the father 
and grandfather of Gouverneur having been on the 
bench, and having also been members of the pro- 
vincial legislature, where they took the popular 
side, and stood up stoutly for the rights of the 
Assembly in the wearisome and interminable con- 
flicts waged by the latter against the prerogatives 
of the crown and the powers of the royal governors. 
The Morrises were restless, adventurous men, of 
erratic temper and strong intellect ; and, with far 
more than his share of the family talent and bril- 
liancy, yoimg Gouverneur also inherited a certain 
whimsical streak that ran through his character. 
His mother was one of the Huguenot Gouvemeurs, 
who had been settled in New York since the revo- 
cation of the Edict of Nantes ; and it was perhaps 
the French blood in his veins that gave him the 
alert vivacity and keen sense of humor that distin- 
guished him from most of the great Revolutionary 
statesmen who were his contemporaries. 

He was a bright, active boy, fond of shooting 
and out-door sports, and was early put to school 



His Youth : Colonial New York 3 

at the old Huguenot settlement of New Roche lie, 
where the church service was still sometimes held 
in French; and he there learned to speak and 
write this language almost as well as he could 
Enghsh. Thence, after the usual preparatory in- 
struction, he went to King's College — now, with 
altered name and spirit, Columbia — in New York. 
The years of his childhood were stirring ones for 
the colonies; for England was then waging the 
greatest and most successful of her colonial con- 
tests with France and Spain for the possession of 
eastern North America. Such contests, with their 
usual savage accompaniments in the way of Indian 
warfare, always fell with especial weight on New 
York, whose border lands were not only claimed, 
but even held by the French, and within whose 
boundaries lay the great confederacy of the Six 
Nations, the most crafty, warlike, and formidable 
of all the native races, infinitely more to be dreaded 
than the Algonquin tribes with whom the othei' 
colonies had to deal. Nor was this war any excep 
tion to the rule ; for battle after battle was fought 
on our soil, from the day when, unassisted, the 
purely colonial troops of New York and New Eng- 
land at Lake George destroyed Baron Dieskau's 
mixed host of French regulars, Canadian militia, 
and Indian allies, to that still more bloody day 
when, on the shores of Lake Champlain, Aber- 
crombie's great army of British and Americans 



4 Gouverneur Morris 

recoiled before the fiery genius of Montcalm. 
When once the war was ended by the complete 
and final overthrow of the French power, and the 
definite estabHshment of English supremacy along 
the whole Atlantic seaboard, the bickering which 
was always going on between Great Britain and 
her American subjects, and which was but par- 
tially suppressed even when they were forced to 
join in common efforts to destroy a common foe, 
broke out far more fiercely than ever. While the 
colonists were still reaping the aftermath of the 
contest in the shape of desolating border warfare 
against those Indian tribes who had joined in the 
famous conspiracy of Pontiac, the Royal Parlia- 
ment passed the Stamp Act, and thereby began 
the struggle that ended in the Revolution. 

England's treatment of her American subjects 
was thoroughly selfish; but that her conduct 
toward them was a wonder of tyranny will not 
now be seriously asserted; on the contrary, she 
stood decidedly above the general European 
standard in such matters, and certainly treated 
her colonies far better than France and Spain did 
theirs ; and she herself had undoubted grounds for 
complaint in, for example, the readiness of the 
Americans to claim military help in time of danger, 
together with their frank reluctance to pay for it. 
It was impossible that she should be so far in 
advance of the age as to treat her colonists as 



His Youth : Colonial New York 5 

equals ; they themselves were sometimes quite as 
intolerant in their behavior toward men of a dif- 
ferent race, creed, or color. The New England 
Puritans lacked only the power, but not the will, 
to behave almost as badly toward the Pennsyl- 
vania Quakers as did the Episcopalian English 
toward themselves. Yet granting all this, the 
fact remains, that in the Revolutionary War the 
Americans stood toward the British as the Prot- 
estant peoples stood toward the Catholic powers 
in the sixteenth century, as the Parliamentarians 
stood toward the Stuarts in the seventeenth, or 
as the upholders of the American Union stood 
toward the Confederate slaveholders in the nine- 
teenth; that is, they warred victoriously for the 
right in a struggle whose outcome vitally affected 
the welfare of the whole human race. They 
settled, once for all, that thereafter the people of 
English stock should spread at will over the 
world's waste spaces, keeping all their old lib- 
erties and winning new ones; and they took the 
first and longest step in establishing the great 
principle that thenceforth those Europeans, who 
by their strength and daring founded new states 
abroad, should be deemed to have done so for 
their own profit as freemen, and not for the 
benefit of their more timid, lazy, or contented 
brethren who stayed behind. 

The rulers of Great Britain, and to a large 



6 Gouverneur Morris 

extent its people, looked upon the American col- 
onies as existing primarily for the good of the 
mother coimtry : they put the harshest restrictions 
on American trade in the interests of British mer- 
chants ; they discouraged the spread of the Ameri- 
cans westward; and they claimed the right to 
decide for both parties the proportions in which 
they should pay their shares of the common 
burdens. The English and Americans were not 
the subjects of a common sovereign; for the 
English were themselves the sovereigns, the 
Americans were the subjects. Whether their 
yoke bore heavily or bore lightly, whether it 
galled or not, mattered little ; it was enough that 
it was a yoke to warrant a proud, free people in 
throwing it off. We could not thankfully take as 
a boon part only of what we felt to be our lawful 
due, " We do not claim liberty as a privilege, but 
challenge it as a right," said the men of New York, 
through their legislature, in 1764; and all Ameri- 
cans felt with them. 

Yet, for all this, the feeling of loyalty was 
strong and hard to overcome throughout the prov- 
inces, and especially in New York. The Assembly 
wrangled with the royal governor ; the merchants 
and shipmasters combined to evade the intolerable 
harshness of the laws of trade that tried to make 
them customers of England only; the house- 
holders bitterly resented the attempts to quarter 



His Youth : Colonial New York 7 

troops upon them; while the soldiers of the gar- 
rison were from time to time involved in brawls 
with the lower ranks of the people, especially the 
sailors, as the seafaring population was large, and 
much given to forcibly releasing men taken by the 
press-gang for the British warships ; but in spite 
of everything there was a genuine sentiment of 
affection and respect for the British crown and 
kingdom. It is perfectly possible that if British 
statesmen had shown less crass and brutal stupid- 
ity, if they had shown even the wise negligence of 
Walpole, this feeling of loyalty would have been 
strong enough to keep England and America 
united until they had learned how to accommo- 
date themselves to the rapidly changing condi- 
tions ; but the chance was lost when once a prince 
like George the Third came to the throne. It has 
been the fashion to represent this king as a well- 
meaning, though dull person, whose good morals 
and excellent intentions partially atoned for his 
mistakes of judgment ; but such a view is curiously 
false. His private life, it is true, showed the very 
admirable but commonplace virtues, as well as the 
appalling intellectual littleness, barrenness, and 
stagnation, of the average British green-grocer; 
but in his public career, instead of rising to the 
level of harmless and imimportant mediocrity 
usually reached by the sovereigns of the House 
of Hanover, he fairly rivaled the Stuarts in his 



8 Gouverneur Morris 

perfidy, wrong-headedness, political debauchery, 
and attempts to destroy free government, and to 
replace it by a system of personal despotism. It 
needed all the successive blunders both of himself 
and of his Tory ministers to reduce the loyal party 
in New York to a minority, by driving the mod- 
erate men into the patriotic or American camp ; and 
even then the loyalist minority remained large 
enough to be a formidable power, and to pltmge 
the embryonic state into a ferocious civil war, 
carried on, as in the Carolinas and Georgia, with 
even more bitterness than the contest against the 
British. 

The nature of this loyalist party and the 
strength of the conflicting elements can only be 
imderstood after a glance at the many nation- 
alities that in New York were being blended into 
one. The descendants of the old Dutch inhabi- 
tants were still more nimierous than those of any 
other one race, while the French Huguenots, who, 
being of the same Calvinistic faith, were closely 
mixed with them, and had been in the land nearly 
as long, were also plentiful; the Scotch and 
Scotch- or Anglo-Irish, mostly Presbyterians, 
came next in point of numbers ; the EngUsh, both 
of Old and New England, next ; there were large 
bodies of Germans; and there were also settle- 
ments of Gaelic Highlanders, and some Welsh, 
Scandinavians, etc. Just prior to the Revolution 



His Youth : Colonial New York 9 

there were in New York city two Episcopalian 
churches, three Dutch Reformed, three Presby- 
terian (Scotch and Irish), one French, two German 
(one Lutheran and one Calvinistic, aUied to the 
Dutch Reformed) ; as well as places of worship for 
the then insignificant religious bodies of the Meth- 
odists, Baptists (largely Welsh), Moravians (Ger- 
man), Quakers, and Jews. There was no Roman 
Catholic church until after the Revolution ; in fact 
before that date there were hardly any Roman 
Catholics in the colonies, except in Maryland and 
Pennsylvania, and in New York they did not 
acquire any strength until after the War of 18 12. 

This mixture of races is very clearly shown by 
the ancestry of the half-dozen great men brought 
forth by New York during the Revolution. Of 
these, one, Alexander Hamilton, stands in the very 
first class of American statesmen ; two more, John 
Jay and Gouverneur Morris, come close behind 
him; the others, Philip Schuyler, Robert Living- 
ston, and George Clinton, were of lesser, but still 
of more than merely local, note. They were all 
bom and bred on this side of the Atlantic. Ham- 
ilton's father was of Scotch, and his mother of 
French Huguenot, descent; Morris came on one 
side of English, and on the other of French 
Huguenot, stock ; Jay, of French Huguenot blood, 
had a mother who was Dutch; Schuyler was 
purely Dutch; Livingston was Scotch on his 



lo Gouverneur Morris 

father's, and Dutch on his mother's, side; the 
Clintons were of Anglo-Irish origin, but married 
into the old Dutch families. In the same way, it 
was Herkomer, of German parentage, who led the 
New York levies, and fell at their head in the 
bloody fight against the Tories and Indians at 
Oriskany; it was the Irishman Montgomery who 
died leading the New York troops against Quebec ; 
while yet another of the few generals allotted 
to New York by the Continental Congress was 
MacDougall, of Gaelic Scotch descent. The 
colony was already developing an ethnic type of 
its own, quite distinct from that of England. No 
American State of the present day, not even 
Wisconsin or Minnesota, shows so many and 
important "foreign" or non-English elements as 
New York, and for that matter Pennsylvania and 
Delaware, did a century or so ago. In fact, in 
New York the English element in the blood has 
grown greatly during the past century, owing to 
the enormous New England immigration that took 
place during its first half ; and the only important 
addition to the race conglomerate has been made 
by the Celtic Irish. The New England element 
in New York in 1775 was small and unimportant; 
on Long Island, where it was largest, it was mainly 
Tory or neutral ; in the city itself, however, it was 
aggressively patriotic. 

Recent English writers, and some of our own as 



His Youth : Colonial New York n 

well, have foretold woe to our nation, because the 
blood of the Cavalier and the Roundhead is being 
diluted with that of "German boors and Irish 
cotters." The alarm is needless. As a matter of 
fact the majority of the people of the middle 
colonies at the time of the Revolution were the 
descendants of Dutch and German boors and 
Scotch and Irish cotters ; and in a less degree the 
same was true of Georgia and the Carolinas. Even 
in New England, where the English stock was 
purest, there was plenty of other admixture, and 
two of her most distinguished Revolutionary 
families bore, one the Huguenot name of Bowdoin, 
and the other the Irish name of Sullivan. Indeed, 
from the very outset, from the days of Cromwell, 
there has been a large Irish admixture in New 
England. When our people began their existence 
as a nation, they already differed in blood from 
their ancestral relatives across the Atlantic much 
as the latter did from their forebears beyond the 
German Ocean ; and on the whole, the immigration 
since has not materially changed the race strains 
in our nationality ; a century back we were even 
less homogeneous than we are now. It is no doubt 
true that we are in the main an offshoot of the 
English stem; and cousins to our kinsfolk of 
Britain we perhaps may be; but brothers we 
certainly are not. 

But the process of assimilating, or as we should 



12 Gouverneur Morris 

now say, of Americanizing, all foreign and non- 
English elements was going on almost as rapidly a 
hundred years ago as it is at present. A young 
Dutchman or Huguenot felt it necessary, then, to 
learn English, precisely as a yoiing Scandinavian 
or German does now; and the churches of the 
former at the end of the last century were obliged 
to adopt English as the language for their ritual 
exactly as the churches of the latter do at the end 
of this. The most stirring, energetic, and pro- 
gressive life of the colony was English; and all 
the young fellows of push and ambition gradually 
adopted this as their native language, and then 
refused to belong to congregations where the ser- 
vice was carried on in a less familiar speech. 
Accordingly the Dutch Reformed churches dwin- 
dled steadily, while the Episcopalian and Presby- 
terian swelled in the same ratio, until in 1764 the 
former gained a new and lasting lease of life by 
reluctantly adopting the prevailing tongue ; though 
Dutch was also occasionally used imtil forty years 
later. 

In fact, during the century that elapsed between 
the final British conquest of the colony and the 
Revolution, the New Yorkers — Dutch, French, 
German, Irish, and English — had become in the 
main welded into one people; they felt alike 
toward outsiders, having chronic quarrels with 
the New England States as well as with Great 



His Youth : Colonial New York 13 

Britain, and showing, indeed, but little more 
jealous hostility toward the latter than they did 
toward Connecticut and New Hampshire. 

The religious differences no longer corresponded 
to the differences of language. Half of the adher- 
ents of the Episcopalian Church were of Dutch or 
Huguenot blood; the leading ministers of the 
Dutch Church were of Scotch parentage ; and the 
Presbyterians included some of every race. The 
colonists were all growing to call themselves Eng- 
lishmen; when Mayor Cruger, and a board of 
aldermen with names equally Dutch, signed the 
non-importation agreement, they prefaced it by 
stating that they claimed "their rights as English- 
men." But though there were no rivalries of 
race, there were many and bitter of class and 
religion, the different Protestant sects hating one 
another with a virulence much surpassing that 
with which they now regard even Catholics. 

The colony was in government an aristocratic 
republic, its constitution modeled on that of 
England and similar to it; the power lay in the 
hands of certain old and wealthy families, Dutch 
and English, and there was a limited freehold 
suffrage. The great landed families, the Living- 
stons, Van Rensselaers, Schuylers, Van Cortlandts, 
Phillipses, ]\Iorrises, with their huge manorial 
estates, their riches, their absolute social pre- 
eminence and their -unquestioned political 



14 Gouverneur Morris 

headship, formed a proud, pohshed, and powerful 
aristocracy, deep rooted in the soil; for over a 
century their sway was unbroken, save by contests 
between themselves or with the royal governor, 
and they furnished the colony with military, 
political, and social leaders for generation after 
generation. They owned numerous black slaves, 
and lived in state and comfort on their broad 
acres, tenant-farmed, in the great, roomy manor- 
houses, with wainscoted walls and huge fireplaces, 
and round about the quaint old gardens, prim and 
formal with their box hedges and precise flower 
beds. They answered closely to the Whig lords 
of England, and indeed were often connected with 
the ruling orders abroad by blood or marriage; 
as an example, Staats Long Morris, Gouverneur' s 
elder brother, who remained a royalist, and rose to 
be a major-general in the British army, married 
the Duchess of Gordon. Some of the manors were 
so large that they sent representatives to the 
Albany legislature, to sit alongside of those from 
the towns and counties. 

Next in importance to the great manorial lords 
came the rich merchants of New York; many 
families, like the Livingstons, the most prominent 
of all, had representatives in both classes. The 
merchants v/ere somewhat of the type of Fro- 
bisher, Hawkins, Klaesoon, and other old English 
and Dutch sea-worthies, who were equally keen 



His Youth : Colonial New York 15 

as fighters and traders. They were shrewd, 
daring, and prosperous; they were often their 
own shipmasters, and during the incessant wars 
against the French and Spaniards went into 
privateering ventures with even more zest and 
spirit than into peaceful trading. Next came the 
smaller landed proprietors, who also possessed 
considerable local influence ; such was the family 
of the Clintons. The law, too, was beginning to 
take high rank as an honorable and influential 
profession. 

Most of the gentry were Episcopalians, theirs 
being practically the state church, and very influ- 
ential and wealthy ; some belonged to the Calvin- 
istic bodies, — notably the Livingstons, who were 
in large part Presbyterians, while certain of their 
number were prominent members of the Dutch 
congregations. It was from among the gentry 
that the little group of New York revolutionary 
leaders came; men of singular purity, courage, 
and ability, who, if they could not quite rank with 
the brilliant Virginians of that date, nevertheless 
stood close behind, alongside of the Massachusetts 
men and ahead of those from any other colony; 
that, too, it must be kept in mind, at a time when 
New York was inferior in wealth and population 
to Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, or Virginia, and 
little, if at all, in advance of Maryland or Con- 
necticut. The great families also furnished the 



i6 Gouverneur Morris 

leaders of the loyalists during the war ; such were 
the De Lanceys, whose influence around the 
mouth of the Hudson was second to that of none 
other; and the Johnsons, who, in mansions that 
were also castles, held half-feudal, half-barbaric 
sway over the valley of the upper Mohawk, where 
they were absolute rulers, ready and willing to 
wage war on their own account, relying on their 
numerous kinsmen, their armed negro slaves, their 
trained bands of Gaelic retainers, and their hosts 
of savage allies, drawn from among the dreaded 
Iroquois. 

The bulk of the people were small farmers in the 
country, tradesmen and mechanics in the towns. 
They were for the most part members of some of 
the Calvinistic churches, the great majority of the 
whole population belonging to the Presbyterian 
and Dutch Reformed congregations. The farmers 
were thrifty, set in their ways, and obstinate ; the 
townsmen thrifty also, but restless and turbulent. 
Both farmers and townsmen were thoroughly inde- 
pendent and self-respecting, and were gradually 
getting more and more political power. They had 
always stood tenaciously by their rights, from the 
days of the early Stuart governors, who had com- 
plained loudly of the " Dutch Republicans." But 
they were narrow, jealous of each other as well 
as of outsiders, and slow to act together. 

The political struggles were very bitter. The 



His Youth : Colonial New York 17 

great families, under whose banners they were 
carried on, though all intermarried, were divided 
by keen rivalries into opposing camps. Yet they 
joined in dreading too great an extension of democ- 
racy ; and in return were suspected by the masses, 
who grumblingly followed their lead, of hostility 
to the popular cause. The Episcopalians, though 
greatly in the minority, possessed most power, 
and harassed in every way they dared the dissent- 
ing sects, especially the Presbyterians — for the 
Dutch Reformed and Huguenot churches had cer- 
tain rights guaranteed them by treaty. The Epis- 
copalian clergy were royalists to a man, and it was 
in their congregations that the main strength of 
the Tories lay, although these also contained many 
who became the stanchest of patriots. King's Col- 
lege was controlled by trustees of this faith. They 
were busy trying to turn it into a diminutive imita- 
tion of Oxford, and did their best to make it, in 
its own small way, almost as much a perverse 
miracle of backward and invariable wrong-headed- 
ness as was its great model. Its president, when 
the Revolution broke out, was a real old wine- 
bibbing Tory parson, devoted to every worn-out 
theory that inculcated humble obedience to church 
and crown ; and he was most summarily expelled 
by the mob. 

Some important political consequences arose 
from the fact that the mass of the people belonged 



i8 Gouverneur Morris 

to some one or other of the branches of the Cal- 
vinistic faith — of all faiths the most republican 
in its tendencies. They were strongly inclined to 
put their republican principles into practice as well 
in state as in church; they tended toward hos- 
tility to the crown, and were strenuous in their 
opposition to the extension of the Episcopal power, 
always threatened by some English statesmen; 
their cry was against "the King and the Bishops." 
It is worth noting that the Episcopalian churches 
were shut up when the Revolution broke out, and 
were reopened when the British troops occupied 
the city. The Calvinistic churches, on the con- 
trary, which sided with the revolutionists, were 
shut when the British came into New York, were 
plundered by the troops, and were not reopened 
until after the evacuation. 

Thus three parties developed, although the 
third, destined to overwhelm the others, had not 
yet come to the front. The first consisted of the 
royalists, or monarchists, the men who believed 
that power came from above, from the king and 
the bishops, and who were aristocratic in their 
sympathies; who were Americans only second- 
arily, and who stood by their order against their 
country. This party contained many of the 
great manorial families and also of the merchants ; 
and in certain places, as in Staten Island, the east 
end of Long Island, the upper valley of the 



His Youth : Colonial New York 19 

Mohawk, and part of Westchester Coimty, the 
influence of the upper classes combined with the 
jealousy and ignorance of large sections of the 
lower to give it a clear majority of the whole 
population. The second party was headed by the 
great families of Whig or liberal sympathies, who, 
when the split came, stood by their country, 
although only very moderate republicans; and 
it held also in its ranks the mass of moderate men, 
who wished freedom, were resolute in defense of 
their rights, and had republican leanings, but who 
also appreciated the good in the system under 
which they were living. Finally came the ex- 
tremists, the men of strong republican tendencies, 
whose delight it was to toast Pym, Hampden, and 
the regicides. These were led by the agitators in 
the towns, and were energetic and active, but 
were unable to effect anything until the blunders 
of the British ministers threw the moderate men 
over to their side. They furnished none of the 
greater revolutionary leaders in New York, 
though the Clintons came near the line that 
divided them from the second party. 

The last political contest carried on imder the 
crown occurred in 1768, the year in which Morris 
graduated from college, when the last colonial 
legislature was elected. It reminds us of our own 
days when we read of the fears entertained of the 
solid German vote, and of the hostility to the 



20 Gouverneur Morris 

Irish, who were hated and sneered at as " beggars " 
by the EngHsh party and the rich EpiscopaHans. 
The Irish of those days, however, were Presby- 
terians, and in blood more EngHsh than Gaehc. 
St. Patrick's Day was celebrated then as now, by 
public processions, as well as otherwise ; but when, 
for instance, on March 17, 1766, the Irish resi- 
dents of New York celebrated the day by a dinner, 
they gave certain toasts that would sound 
strangely in the ears of Milesian patriots of the 
present time, for they included "The Protestant 
Interest," and "King William, of glorious, pious, 
and immortal memory." 

The royalist or conservative side in this contest 
in 1768 was led by the De Lance ys, their main 
support being drawn from among the Episco- 
palians, and most of the larger merchants helping 
them. The Whigs, including those with repub- 
lican leanings, followed the Livingstons, and were 
drawn mainly from the Presbyterian and other 
Calvinistic congregations. The moderate men on 
this occasion went with the De Lanceys, and gave 
them the victory. In consequence the colonial 
legislature was conservative and loyal in tone, and 
anti-republican, although not ultra-Tory, as a 
whole; and thus when the Revolutionary out- 
break began it went much slower than was satis- 
factory to the patriot party, and its actions were 
finally set aside by the people. 



His Youth: Colonial New York 21 

When Morris graduated from college, as men- 
tioned above, he was not yet seventeen years old. 
His college career was like that of any other 
bright, quick boy, without over much industry or 
a passion for learning. For mathematics he pos- 
sessed a genuine taste ; he was particularly fond 
of Shakespeare ; and even thus early he showed 
great skill in discussion and much power of argu- 
ment. He made the oration, or graduating 
address, of his class, choosing for the subject 
"Wit and Beauty;" it was by no means a note- 
worthy effort, and was couched in the dreadful 
Johnsonian English of the period. A little later, 
when he took his master's degree, he again de- 
livered an oration — this time on " Love." In 
point .of style this second speech was as bad as 
the first, disfigured by cumbrous Latinisms and a 
hopeless use of the superlative ; but there were one 
or two good ideas in it. 

As soon as he graduated, he set to work to study 
law, deciding on this profession at once as being 
best suited for an active, hopeful, ambitious young 
man of his social standing and small fortune, who 
was perfectly self-confident and conscious of his 
own powers. He soon became interested in his 
studies, and followed them with great patience, 
working hard and mastering both principles and 
details with ease. He was licensed to practise as 
an attorney in 1771, just three years after another 



22 Gouverneur Morris 

young man, destined to stand as his equal in the 
list of New York's four or five noted statesmen, 
John Jay, had likewise been admitted to the bar ; 
and among the very few cases in which Morris was 
engaged of which the record has been kept is one 
concerning a contested election, in which he was 
pitted against Jay, and bore himself well. 

Before this, and while not yet of age, he had 
already begun to play a part in public affairs. 
The colony had been run in debt during the 
French and Indian wars, and a bill was brought 
forward in the New York Assembly to provide 
for this by raising money through the issue of 
interest-bearing bills of credit. The people, indi- 
vidually, were largely in debt, and hailed the 
proposal with much satisfaction, on the theory 
that it would "make money more plenty;" our 
Revolutionary forefathers being unfortimately 
not much wiser or more honest in their ways of 
looking at the public finances than we ourselves, 
in spite of our state repudiators, national green- 
backers, and dishonest silver men. 

Morris attacked the bill very forcibly, and with 
good effect, opposing any issue of paper money, 
which could bring no absolute relief, but merely a 
worse catastrophe of bankruptcy in the end; he 
pointed out that it was nothing but a mischievous 
pretense for putting off the date of a payment that 
would have to be met anyhow, and that ought 



His Youth : Colonial New York 23 

rather to be met at once with honest money 
gathered from the resources of the province. He 
showed the bad effects such a system of artificial 
credit would have on private individuals, the 
farmers and tradesmen, by encouraging them to 
speculate and go deeper into debt; and he criti- 
cized unsparingly the attitude of the majority of 
his fellow citizens in wishing such a measure of 
relief, not only for their short-sighted folly, but 
also for their criminal and selfish dishonesty in 
trying to procure a temporary benefit for them- 
selves at the lasting expense of the community; 
finally he strongly advised them to bear with 
patience small evils in the present rather than to 
remedy them by inflicting infinitely greater ones 
on themselves and their descendants in the future. 

At the law he did very well, having the advan- 
tages of his family name, and of his own fine 
personal appearance. He was utterly devoid of 
embarrassment, and his perfect self-assurance and 
freedom from any timidity or sense of inferiority 
left his manner without the least tinge of awk- 
wardness, and gave clear groimd for his talents 
and ambition to make their mark. 

However, hardworking and devoted to his pro- 
fession though he was, he had the true family rest- 
lessness and craving for excitement, and soon after 
he was admitted to the bar he began to long for 
foreign travel, as was natural enough in a young 



24 Gouverneur Morris 

provincial gentleman of his breeding and educa- 
tion. In a letter to an old friend (William Smith, 
a man of learning, the historian of the colony, and 
afterward its chief justice), in whose office he had 
studied law, he asks advice in the matter, and 
gives as his reasons for wishing to make the trip 
the desire "to form my manners and address by 
the example of the truly polite, to rub off in the 
gay circle a few of the many barbarisms which 
characterize a provincial education, and to curb 
the vain self-sufficiency which arises from compar- 
ing ourselves with companions who are inferior to 
us." He then anticipates the objections that may 
be made on the score of the temptations to which 
he will be exposed by saying: "If it be allowed 
that I have a taste for pleasure, it may naturally 
follow that I shall avoid those low pleasures 
which aboimd on this as well as on the other side 
of the Atlantic. As for these poignant joys which 
are the lot of the affluent, like Tantalus I may 
grasp at them, but they will certainly be out of 
my reach." In this last sentence he touches on 
his narrow means ; and it was on this point that 
his old preceptor harped in making his reply, 
ctmningly instilling into his mind the danger of 
neglecting his business, and bringing up the 
appalling example of an "Uncle Robin," who, 
having made three pleasure trips to England, 
"began to figure with thirty thousand pounds, 



His Youth : Colonial New York 25 

and did not leave five thousand;" going on: 
"What! 'Virtus post nitmmosf Curse on inglori- 
ous wealth?' Spare your indignation. I, too, 
detest the ignorant miser; but both virtue and 
ambition abhor poverty, or they are mad. Rather 
imitate your grandfather [who had stayed in 
America and prospered] than your uncle." 

The advice may have had its effect ; at any rate 
Morris stayed at home, and, with an occasional 
trip to Philadelphia, got all he could out of the 
society of New York, which, little provincial sea- 
port though it was, was yet a gay place, gayer 
than any other American city save Charleston, 
the society consisting of the higher crown officials, 
the rich merchants, and the great landed pro- 
prietors. Into this society Morris, a handsome, 
high-bred young fellow, of easy manners and far 
from puritanical morals, plunged with a will, his 
caustic wit and rather brusque self-assertion 
making him both admired and feared. He en- 
joyed it all to the full, and in his bright, chatty 
letters to his friends pictures himself as working 
hard, but gay enough also: "up all night — balls, 
concerts, assemblies — all of us mad in the pursuit 
of pleasure." 

But the Revolution was at hand; and. both 
pleasure and ofhce-work had to give way to some- 
thing more important. 



CHAPTER 11. 

THE OUTBREAK OF THE REVOLUTION : MORRIS IN 
THE PROVINCIAL CONGRESS. 

DURING the years immediately preceding the 
outbreak of the Revolution, almost all 
people were utterly in the dark as to what 
their future conduct should be. No responsible 
leader thought seriously of separation from the 
mother country, and the bulk of the population 
were still farther from supposing such an event 
to be possible. Indeed it must be remembered 
that all through the Revolutionary War not only 
was there a minority actively favorable to the 
royal cause, but there was also a minority — so 
large that, added to the preceding, it has been 
doubted whether it was not a majority — that was 
but lukewarm in its devotion to the American 
side, and was kept even moderately patriotic 
almost as much by the excesses of the British 
troops and blimders of the British generals and 
ministers as by the valor of our own soldiers, or 
the skill of our own statesmen. We can now see 
clearly that the right of the matter was with the 
patriotic party; and it was a great thing for the 
whole English-speaking race that that section of it 
which was destined to be the most numerous and 

26 



The Outbreak of the Revolution 27 

powerful should not be cramped and fettered by 
the peculiarly galling shackles of provincial de- 
pendency ; but all this was not by any means so 
clear then as now, and some of our best citizens 
thought themselves in honor bound to take the 
opposite side, — though of necessity those among 
our most high-minded men, who were also far- 
sighted enough to see the true nature of the 
struggle, went with the patriots. 

That the loyalists of 1776 were wrong is beyond 
question ; but it is equally beyond question that 
they had greater grounds for believing themselves 
right than had the men who tried to break up the 
Union three-quarters of a century later. That 
these latter had the most hearty faith in the justice 
of their cause need not be doubted ; and he is but 
a poor American whose veins do not thrill with 
pride as he reads of the deeds of desperate prowess 
done by the Confederate armies; but it is most 
unfair to brand the " Tory" of 1776 with a shame 
no longer felt to pertain to the "rebel" of i860. 
Still, there is no doubt, not only that the patriots 
were right, but also that they were as a whole 
superior to the Tories ; they were the men with a 
high ideal of freedom, too fond of liberty, and 
too self-respecting, to submit to foreign rule ; they 
included the mass of hard-working, orderly, and 
yet high-spirited yeomen and freeholders. The 
Tories included those of the gentry who were 



28 Gouverneur Morris 

devoted to aristocratic principles ; the large class 
of timid and prosperous people (like the Pennsyl- 
vania Quakers) ; the many who feared above all 
things disorder; also the very lowest sections 
of the commimity, the lazy, thriftless, and 
vicious who hated their progressive neighbors^ 
as in the Carolinas; and finally the men who 
were really principled in favor of a kingly govern- 
ment. 

Morris was at first no more sure of his soundings 
than were the rest of his companions. He was 
a gentleman of old family, and belonged to the 
ruling EpiscopaHan Church. He was no friend 
to tyranny, and he was a thorough American, but 
he had little faith in extreme democracy. The 
Revolution had two sides ; in the northern Atlantic 
States at least it was almost as much an uprising 
of democracy against aristocracy as it was a con- 
test between America and England; and the 
patriotic Americans, who nevertheless distrusted 
ultra-democratic ideas, suffered many misgivings 
when they let their love for their country over- 
come their pride of caste . The ' ' Sons of Liberty, 
a semi-secret society originating among the mer- 
chants, and very powerful in bringing discontent 
to a head, now showed signs of degenerating into 
a mob; and for mobs Morris, like other clear- 
headed men, felt the most profound dislike and 
contempt. 



The Outbreak of the Revolution 29 

Throughout 1774 he took little part in the 
various commotions, which kept getting more and 
more violent. He was angered by the English 
encroachments, and yet was by no means pleased 
with the measures taken to repel them. The 
gentry, and the moderate men generally, were at 
their wits' ends in trying to lead the rest of the 
people, and were being pushed on farther and 
farther all the time; the leadership, even of the 
Revolutionary party, still rested in their hands; 
but it grew continually less absolute. Said Morris : 
"The spirit of the English Constitution has yet a 
little influence left, and but a little. The remains 
of it, however, will give the wealthy people a 
superiority this time ; but, would they secure it, 
they must banish all schoolmasters and confine all 
knowledge to themselves. , . . The gentry 
begin to fear this. Their committee will be ap- 
pointed; they will deceive the people, and again 
forfeit a share of their confidence. And if these 
instances of what with one side is policy, with 
the other perfidy, shall continue to increase and 
become more frequent, farewell aristocracy. I 
see, and see it with fear and trembling, that if the 
dispute with Britain continues, we shall be under 
the worst of all possible dominions; we shall be 
imder the dominion of a riotous mob. It is the 
interest of all men, therefore, to seek for reunion 
with the parent state." He then goes on to 



30 Gouverneur Morris 

discuss the terms which will make this retinion 
possible, and evidently draws ideas from sources 
as diverse as Rousseau and Pitt, stating, as pre- 
liminaries, that when men come together in 
society, there must be an implied contract that 
" a part of their freedom shall be given up for the 
securit}^ of the remainder. But what part? The 
answer is plain. The least possible, considering 
the circumstances of the society, which constitute 
what may be called its political necessity;" and 
again: "In every society the members have a 
right to the utmost liberty that can be enjoyed 
consistent with the general safety;" while he 
proposes the rather wild remedy of divorcing the 
taxing and the governing powers, giving America 
the right to lay her own imposts, and regulate 
her internal police, and reserving to Great 
Britain that to regulate the trade for the entire 
empire. 

Naturally there was no hope of any compro- 
mise of this sort. The British ministry grew more 
imperious, and the colonies more defiant. At last 
the clash came, and then Morris's thorough Ameri- 
canism and inborn love of freedom and impa- 
tience of tyranny overcame any lingering class 
jealousy, and he cast in his lot with his coimtry- 
men. Once in, he was not of the stuff to waver or 
look back; but like most other Americans, and 
like almost all New Yorkers, he could not for some 



The Outbreak of the Revolution 31 

little time realize how hopeless it was to try to 
close the breach with Great Britain. Hostilities 
had gone on for quite a w^hile before even Wash- 
ington could bring himself to believe that a lasting 
separation was inevitable. 

The Assembly, elected, as shown in the previous 
chapter, at a moment of reaction, was royalist in 
tone. It contained several stanch patriots, but 
the majority, although tm willing to back up the 
British ministers in all their doings, were still more 
hostile to the growing body of republican revo- 
lutionists. They gradually grew wholly out of 
sympathy with the people ; until the latter at last 
gave up all attempts to act through their ordinary 
representatives, and set about electing delegates 
who should prove more faithful. Thereupon, in 
April, 1775, the last colonial legislature adjourned 
for all time, and was replaced by successive bodies 
more in touch vAth the general sentiment of New 
York; that is, by various committees, by a con- 
vention to elect delegates to the Continental Con- 
gress, and then by the Provincial Congress. The 
lists of names in these bodies show not only how 
many leading men certain families contributed, 
but also how mixed the lineage of such families 
was; for among the numerous Ja^^s, Livingstons, 
Ludlows, Van Cortlandts, Roosevelts, Beekmans, 
and others of Dutch, English, and Huguenot an- 
cestry, appear names as distinctly German, Gaelic- 



32 Gouverneur Morris 

Scotch, and Irish, Hke Hoffman, MulHgan, Mac- 
Dougall, Connor.^ 

To the Provincial Congress, from thenceforth on 
the regular governmental body of the colony, 
eighty-one delegates were elected, including Gouv- 
erneur Morris from the coimty of Westchester, and 
seventy were present at the first meeting, which 
took place on May 22 at New York. The voting 

^ The habit of constantly importing indentured Irish serv- 
ants, as well as German laborers, under contract, prevailed 
throughout the colonies ; and the number of men thus im- 
ported was quite sufficient to form a considerable element in 
the population, and to add a new, although perhaps not very 
valuable, strain to our already mixed blood. In taking up at 
random the file of the New York Gazette for 1766, we find 
among the advertisements many offering rewards for run- 
away servants ; such as " three pounds for the runaway 
servant Conner O'Rourke," " ten pounds for the runaway 
Irish servant Philip Maginnis," "five pounds apiece for cer- 
tain runaway German miners — Bruderlein, Baum, Ostmann, 
etc. — imported under contract ;" all this mixed in with ad- 
vertisements of rewards of about the same money value for 
" the mulatto man named Tom," or the " negroes Nero and 
Pompey." Still, in speaking of the Revolutionary armies, the 
word ' ' Irish ' ' must almost always be understood as meaning. 
Presbyterian Irish ; the Catholic Irish had but little hand in 
the war, and that little was limited to furnishing soldiers to 
some of the British regiments. The Presbyterian Irish, how- 
ever, in the Revolutionary armies, played a part as manful 
and valiant as, and even more important than, that taken 
by the Catholic Irish soldiers who served so bravely during 
the great contest between the North and South. The few 
free Catholic Irish already in America in 1776 were for the 
most part heartily loyal ; but they were not numerous 
enough to be of the least consequence. 



The Outbreak of the Revolution 33 

in the Congress was done by counties, each being 
allotted a certain number of votes roughly ap- 
proximating to its population. 

Lexington had been fought, and the war had 
already begim in Massachusetts ; but in New York, 
though it was ablaze with sympathy for the insur- 
gent New Englanders, the royal authority was still 
nominally im questioned, and there had been no 
colHsion with the British troops. Few, if any, of 
the people of the colony as yet aimed at more than 
a redress of their grievances and the restoration of 
their rights and liberties ; they had still no idea of 
cutting loose from Great Britain. Even such an 
avowedly popular and revolutionary body as the 
Provincial Congress contained some few out and 
out Tories and very many representatives of that 
timid, wavering class which always halts midway 
in any course of action, and is ever prone to adopt 
half measures, — a class which in any crisis works 
quite as much harm as the actively vicious, and is 
almost as much hated and even more despised by 
the energetic men of strong convictions. The 
timid good are never an element of strength in a 
commimity ; but they have always been well rep- 
resented in New York. During the Revolutionary 
War, it is not probable that much more than half of 
her people were ever in really hearty and active 
sympathy with the patriots. 

Morris at once took a prominent place in the 

3 



34 Gouverneur Morris 

Congress, and he showed the national bent of his 
mind when he seconded a resolution to the effect 
that implicit obedience ought to be rendered to the 
Continental Congress in all matters pertaining to 
the general regulation of the associated colonies. 
The Assembly, however, was by no means certain 
how far it would be well to go ; and the majority 
declined either to approve or disapprove of the 
proceedings of the late Continental Congress. 
They agreed to subscribe to the association, and 
recommended the same course to their constitu- 
ents, but added that they did not believe the latter 
should be forced to do so. 

Still, with all their doubting and faint-hearted- 
ness, they did set about preparing for resistance, 
and for at least the possibility of concerted action 
with the other colonies. The first step, of course, 
was to provide for raising funds ; this was consid- 
ered by a committee of which Morris was a 
member, and he prepared and drew up their 
report. In the state of public feeling, which was 
nearly a unit against "taxation without repre- 
sentation" abroad, but was the reverse of unani- 
mous as to submitting even to taxation with 
representation at home, it was impossible to raise 
money by the ordinary method; indeed, though 
the mass of active patriots were willing to sacrifice 
much, perhaps all, for the cause, yet there were 
quite as many citizens whose patriotism was luke- 



The Outbreak of the Revolution 35 

warm enough already, and could not stand any 
additional chilling. Such people are always willing 
to face what may be called a staved-off sacrifice, 
however ; and promises to pay in the future what 
they can, but will not, pay in the present, come 
under this head. Besides, there would have been 
other difficulties in the way, and in fact it was 
impossible to raise the amount needed by direct 
taxation. Accordingly Morris, in his report on 
behalf of the committee, recommended an issue 
of paper money, and advised that this should not 
be done by the colony itself, but that the Con- 
tinental Congress should strike the whole sum 
needed, and apportion the several shares to the 
different colonies, each of them being bound to 
discharge its own particular part, and all together 
to be liable for whatever any particular colony 
was imable to pay. This plan secured a wide 
credit and circulation to the currency, and, what 
was equally desirable, created throughout the 
colonies a common interest and common respon- 
sibility on a most important point, and greatly 
strengthened the bonds of their union. Morris 
even thus early showed the breadth of his far- 
seeing patriotism ; he was emphatically an Amer- 
ican first, a New Yorker next ; the whole tone of 
his mind was thoroughly national. He took the 
chief part in urging the adoption of the report, and 
made a most telling speech in its favor before the 



36 Gouverneur Morris 

Assembly, a mixed audience of the prominent men 
of the colony being also present. The report was 
adopted and forwarded to the Continental Con- 
gress ; Morris was felt on all sides to have alreadv 
taken his place among the leaders, and from 
thenceforth he was placed on almost every impor- 
tant committee of the Provincial Congress. 

This body kept on its course, corresponding with 
the other colonies, exchanging thinly veiled threats 
with the Johnsons, the powerful Tory overlords of 
the upper Mohawk, and preparing rather feebly 
for defense, being hampered by a total lack of 
funds or credit imtil the Continental currency was 
coined. But they especially busied themselves 
with a plan of reconciliation with England; and 
in fact were so very cautious and moderate as to 
be reproached by their chosen agent in England, 
Edmimd Burke, for their "scrupulous timidity." 
The Congress, by the way, showed some symptoms 
of an advance in toleration, at least so far as 
the Protestant sects went; for it was opened 
and closed by ministers of the Episcopal, Dutch 
Reformed, Presbyterian, Baptist, and other sects, 
each in turn; but, as will shortly be seen, the 
feeling against Catholics was quite as narrow- 
minded and intense as ever. This was natural 
enough in colonial days, when Protestantism and 
national patriotism were almost interchangeable 
terms; for the hereditary and embittered foes of 



The Outbreak of the Revolution 37 

the Americans, the French and Spaniards, were 
all Catholics, and even many of the Indians were 
of the same faith ; and -undoubtedly the wonderful 
increase in the spirit of tolerance shown after the 
Revolution was due in part to the change of the 
Catholic French into our allies, and of the Prot- 
estant English into our most active foes. It 
must be remembered, however, that the Catholic 
gentry of Maryland played the same part in the 
Revolution that their Protestant neighbors did. 
One of the famous Carroll family was among the 
signers of the Declaration of Independence ; and, 
on the other hand, one of the Cliftons was a noted 
loyalist leader. 

Morris took a prominent part, both in and out 
of committee, in trying to shape the plan of recon- 
ciliation, although utterly disapproving of many of 
the ways in which the subject was handled ; for he 
had all the contempt natural to most young men 
of brains, decision, and fiery temper for his timid, 
short-sighted, and prolix colleagues. The report 
was not all to his taste in the final shape in which 
it was adopted. It consisted of a series of articles 
recommending the repeal of the obnoxious statutes 
of the Imperial Parliament, the regulation of trade 
for the benefit of the whole empire, the establish- 
ment of triennial colonial legislatures, and also 
asserting the right of the colonies to manage their 
internal polity to suit themselves, and their 



38 Gouverneur Morris 

willingness to do their part, according to their 
capacities, for the general defense of the empire. 
The eighth article contained a denial of the right 
of " Great Britain, or any other earthly legislature 
or tribunal, to interfere in the ecclesiastical or 
religious concerns of the colonies," together with 
a "protest against the indulgence and establish- 
ment of popery all along their interior confines;" 
this being called forth by what was known as the 
"Quebec Bill," whereby the British Parliament 
had recently granted extraordinary powers and 
privileges to the Canadian clergy, with the 
obvious purpose of conciliating that powerful 
priesthood, and thereby converting — as was 
actually done — the recently conquered French of 
the St. Lawrence valley into efficient allies of the 
British government against the old Protestant 
colonies. 

This eighth article was ridiculous, and was espe- 
cially objected to by Morris. In one of his vigor- 
ous, deliciously fresh, and humorous letters, dated 
Jtme 30, 1775, and addressed to John Jay, then 
in the Continental Congress, he writes : 

The foolish religious business I opposed until I was 
weary; it was carried by a very small majority, and 
my dissent entered. . . . The article about religion 
is most arrant nonsense, and would do as well in a 
High Dutch Bible as the place it now stands in. 

I drew a long report for our committee, to which 
they could make no objections excepting that none 



The Outbreak of the Revolution 39 

of them could understand it. ... I was pleased at 
the rejection, because, as I observed to you before, 
I think the question ought to be simplified. 

I address this letter to you, but I shall be glad [if] 
you will read it to Livingston, for I intend it for both 
of you; make my compliments to him, and tell him 
that I shall write to him when I have time to write a 
good letter — this is a damned bad one, and would not 
exist, if I did not think it a duty to myself to show 
my friends that I had no hand in that foolish religious 
business. I am, as you well know, your friend, etc. 

Morris did not believe in a colonial assembly 
making overtures for a reconciliation, as he 
thought this was the province of the Continental 
Congress. The majority was against him, but he 
was a clever politician and parliamentary tac- 
tician, as well as a great statesman, and he fairly 
outwitted and hoodwinked his opponents, per- 
suading them finally to adopt the report in the 
form of a mere expression of opinions to be sent 
to their congressional delegates, with a prayer 
that the latter would "use every effort for the 
compromising of this unnatural quarrel between 
the parent and child." In this shape it was 
forwarded to the delegates, who answered that 
they would do all in their power to compromise 
the quarrel, and added a postscript, written by 
Jay himself, to the effect that they deemed it 
better not to make any mention of the religious 
article before the Congress, as they thought it 



40 Gouverneur Morris 

wise to bury " all disputes on ecclesiastical points, 
which have for ages had no other tendency than 
that of banishing peace and charity from the 
world." 

While all this was pending, and though Bunker 
Hill had been fought, and the war was in full prog- 
ress round Boston, New York yet maintained 
what might almost be described as an attitude of 
armed neutrality. The city was so exposed to the 
British warships in the bay, and the surrounding 
population was so doubtful, that the patriot party 
dared not take the deciding steps, especially as so 
many of its members still climg to the hope of a 
peaceful settlement. Morris announced frankly 
that he did not believe in breaking the peace imtil 
they were prepared to take the consequences. 
Indeed, when the few British troops left the 
city to join the garrison in Boston, he strongly 
opposed the action of the Sons of Liberty, who 
gathered hastily together, and took away the 
cartloads of arms and ammunition that the sol- 
diers were taking with them. The Congress, to 
their honor, discouraged, to the best of their 
power, the rioting and mobbing of Tories in the 
city. 

In fact. New York's position was somewhat like 
that of Kentucky at the outbreak of the Civil War. 
Her backwardness in definitely throwing in her lot 
with the revolutionists was clearly brought out by 



The Outbreak of the Revolution 41 

a rather ludicrous incident. General Washington, 
on his way to take command of the Continental 
army round Boston, passed through New York the 
same day the royal governor. Try on, arrived by 
sea, and the authorities were cast into a great 
quandary as to how they should treat two such 
kings of Brentford when the one rose was so small. 
Finally they compromised by sending a guard of 
honor to attend each ; Montgomery and Morris, as 
delegates from the Assembly, received Washington 
and brought him before that body, which addressed 
him in terms of cordial congratulation, but ended 
with a noteworthy phrase, — that "when the con- 
test should be decided by an accommodation with 
the mother country, he should deliver up the 
important deposit that had been confided to his 
hands." 

These words give us the key to the situation. 
Even the patriots of the colony could not realize 
that there was no hope of an "accommodation;" 
and they were hampered at every step by the fear 
of the British frigates, and of the numerous Tories. 
The latter were very bold and defiant ; when Con- 
gress tried to disarm them, they banded them- 
selves together, bade the authorities defiance, and 
plainly held the upper hand on Staten Island and 
in Queens County. New York furnished many 
excellent soldiers to the royal armies during the 
war, and from among her gentry came the most 



42 Gouverneur Morris 

famous of the Tory leaders, — such as Johnson and 
De Lancey, whose prowess was felt by the hapless 
people of their own native province ; De Peyster, 
who was Ferguson's second in command at King's 
Mountain ; and Cruger, who, in the Carolinas, in- 
flicted a check upon Greene himself. The Tories 
were helped also by the jealousy felt toward some 
of the other colonies, especially Connecticut, whose 
people took the worst possible course for the 
patriot side by threatening to "crush down" New 
York, and by finally furnishing an armed and 
mounted mob which rode suddenly into the city, 
and wrecked the office of an obnoxious loyalist 
printer named Rivington. This last proceeding 
caused great indignation, and nearly made a split 
in the Revolutionary camp. 

New York had thus some cause for her inaction ; 
nevertheless, her lack of boldness and decision 
were not creditable to her, and she laid herself 
open to just reproaches. Nor can Morris himself 
be altogether freed from the charge of having 
clung too long to the hope of a reconciliation and 
to a policy of half measures. He was at that 
time chairman of a legislative committee which 
denounced any projected invasion of Canada 
(therein, however, only following the example of 
the Continental Congress), and refused to allow 
Ethan Allen to undertake one, as that adventurous 
partisan chieftain requested. But Morris was too 



The Outbreak of the Revolution 43 

clear-sighted to occupy a doubtful position long; 
and he now began to see things clearly as they 
were, and to push his slower or more timid asso- 
ciates forward along the path which they had set 
out to tread. He was instrumental in getting the 
militia into somewhat better shape ; and, as it 
was fotmd impossible to get enough Continental 
money, a colonial paper currency was issued. In 
spite of the quarrel with Connecticut, a force from 
that province moved in to take part in the defense 
of New York. 

Yet, in the main, the policy of the New York 
Congress still continued both weak and change- 
able, and no improvement was effected Vv'hen it 
was dissolved and a second elected. To this body 
the loyalist counties of Richmond and Queens 
refused to return delegates, and throughout the 
colony affairs grew more disorderly, and the ad- 
ministration of justice came nearly to a standstill. 
Finding that the local congress seemed likely to 
remain unable to make up its mind how to act, 
the Continental leaders at last took matters into 
their own hands, and marched a force into New 
York city early in February, 1776. This had a 
most bracing effect upon the provincial authori- 
ties ; yet they still continued to allow the British 
warships in the bay to be supplied with provisions, 
nor was this attitude altered until in April Wash- 
ington arrived with the main Continental army. 



44 Gouverneur Morris 

He at once insisted that a final break should be 
made; and about the same time the third Pro- 
vincial Congress was elected. Morris, again re- 
turned for Westchester, headed the bolder spirits, 
who had now decided that the time had come to 
force their associates out of their wavering course, 
and to make them definitely cast in their lot with 
their fellow Americans. Things had come to a 
point which made a decision necessary; the 
gathering of the Continental forces on Manhattan 
Island and the threatening attitude of the British 
fleet and army made it impossible for even the 
most timid to keep on lingering in a state of 
uncertainty. So the Declaration of Independence 
was ratified, and a state constitution organized; 
then the die was cast, and thereafter New York 
manfully stood by the result of the throw. 

The two Provincial Congresses that decided on 
this course held their sessions in a time of the 
greatest tumult, when New York was threatened 
hourly by the British ; and long before their work 
was ended they had hastily to leave the city. 
Before describing what they did, a glance should 
be taken at the circumstances under which it was 
done. 

The peaceable citizens, especially those with 
any property, gradually left New York; and it 
remained in possession of the raw levies of the 
Continentals, while Staten Island received Howe 



The Outbreak of the Revolution 45 

with open arms, and he was enabled without diffi- 
culty to disembark his great force of British and 
German mercenaries on Long Island. The much 
smaller, motley force opposed to him, unorganized, 
ill-armed, and led by utterly inexperienced men, 
was beaten, with hardly an effort, in the battle 
that followed, and only escaped annihilation 
through the skill of Washington and the supine 
blimdering of Howe. Then it was whipped up 
the Hudson and beyond the borders of the State, 
the broken remnant fleeing across New Jersey; 
and though the brilliant feats of arms at Trenton 
and Princeton enabled the Americans to reconquer 
the latter province, southern New York lay under 
the heel of the British till the close of the war. 

Thus Morris, Jay, and the other New York 
leaders were obliged for six years to hold up their 
cause in a half -conquered State, a very large pro- 
portion of whose population was lukewarm or 
hostile. The odds were heavy against the patriots, 
because their worst foes were those of their own 
household. English writers are fond of insisting 
upon the alleged fact that America only won her 
freedom by the help of foreign nations. Such help 
was certainly most important, but, on the other 
hand, it must be remembered that during the first 
and vital years of the contest the Revolutionary 
colonists had to struggle imaided against the 
British, their mercenary German and Indian allies, 



46 Gouverneur Morris 

Tories, and even French Canadians. When the 
French court declared in our favor the worst was 
already over; Trenton had been won, Burgoyne 
had been captured, and Valley Forge was a 
memory of the past. 

We did not owe our main disasters to the might 
of our foes, nor our final triumph to the help of 
our friends. It was on our own strength that we 
had to rely, and it was with our own folly and 
weakness that we had to contend. The Revolu- 
tionary leaders can never be too highly praised; 
but taken in bulk the Americans of the last quarter 
of the eighteenth century do not compare to ad- 
vantage with the Americans of the third quarter 
of the nineteenth. In our Civil War it was the 
people who pressed on the leaders, and won almost 
as much in spite of as because of them; but the 
leaders of the Revolution had to goad the rank 
and file into line. They were forced to contend 
not only with the active hostility of the Tories, but 
with the passive neutrality of the indifferent, and 
the selfishness, jealousy, and short-sightedness of 
the patriotic. Had the Americans of 1776 been 
united, and had they possessed the stubborn, 
unyielding tenacity and high devotion to an ideal 
shown by the North, or the heroic constancy and 
matchless valor shown by the South, in the Civil 
War, the British would have been driven off 
the continent before three years were over. 



The Outbreak of the Revolution 47 

It is probable that nearly as great a proportion 
of our own people were actively or passively 
opposed to the formation of our Union originally 
as were in favor of its dissolution in i860. This 
was one of the main reasons why the war dragged 
on so long. It may be seen by the fact, among 
others, that when in the Carolinas and Georgia a 
system of relentless and undying partisan warfare 
not only crushed the Tories, but literally destroyed 
them from off the face of the earth, then the 
British, though still victorious in almost every 
pitched battle, were at once forced to abandon 
the field. 

Another reason was the inferior military capa- 
city of the Revolutionary armies. The Continental 
troops, when trained, were excellent ; but in almost 
every battle they were mixed with more or less 
worthless militia ; and of the soldiers thus obtained 
all that can be said is that their officers could 
never be sure that they w^ould fight, nor their 
enemies that they would run away. The Revo- 
lutionary troops certainly fell short of the standard 
reached by the volunteers who fought Shiloh and 
Gettysburg. The British rarely found them to be 
such foes as they afterward met at New Orleans 
and Lundy's Lane. Throughout the Revolution 
the militia were invariably leaving their posts at 
critical times ; they would grow either homesick or 
dejected, and would then go home at the very 



48 Gouverneur Morris 

crisis of the campaign ; they did not begin to show 
the stubbornness and resolution to "see the war 
through" so common among their descendants in 
the contending Federal and Confederate armies. 

The truth is that in 1776 our main task was to 
shape new political conditions, and then to recon- 
cile our people to them; whereas in i860 we had 
merely to fight fiercely for the preservation of 
what was already ours. In the first emergency 
we needed statesmen, and in the second warriors ; 
and the statesmen and warriors were forthcoming. 
A comparison of the men who came to the front 
during these, the two heroic periods of the repub- 
lic, brings out this point clearly. 

Washington, alike statesman, soldier, and pa- 
triot, stands alone. He was not only the greatest 
American; he was also one of the greatest men 
the world has ever known. Few centuries and 
few countries have ever seen his like. Among the 
people of English stock there is none to compare 
with him, imless perhaps Cromwell, utterly dif- 
ferent though the latter was. Of Americans, 
Lincoln alone is worthy to stand even second. 

As for our other statesmen: Franklin, Hamil- 
ton, Jefferson, Adams, and their fellows most 
surely stand far above Seward, Sumner, Chase, 
Stanton, and Stevens, great as were the services 
which these, and those like them, rendered. 

But when we come to the fighting men, all this 



The Outbreak of the Revolution 49 

is reversed. As a mere military man, Washington 
himself cannot rank with the wonderful war-chief 
who for four years led the Army of Northern Vir- 
ginia ; and the names of Washington and Greene 
fill up the short list of really good Revolutionary 
generals. Against these the Civil War shows a 
roll that contains not only Lee, but also Grant and 
Sherman, Jackson and Johnson, Thomas, Sheri- 
dan, and Farragut, — leaders whose volimteer sol- 
diers and sailors, at the end of their four years' 
service, were ready and more than able to match 
themselves against the best regular forces of 
Europe. 



CHAPTER III. 

independence: forming the state consti- 
tution. 

THE third Provincial Congress, which came 
together in May, and before the close of its 
sessions was obliged to adjourn to White 
Plains, had to act on the Declaration of Independ- 
ence, and provide for the foundation of a new 
state government. 

Morris now put himself at the head of the 
patriotic party, and opened the proceedings by a 
long and very able speech in favor of adopting 
the recommendation of the Continental Congress 
that the colonies should form new governments. 
In his argument he went at length into the history 
and growth of the dispute with Great Britain; 
spoke of the efforts made in the past for recon- 
ciliation, and then showed clearly how such efforts 
were now not only hopeless, but also no longer 
compatible with the dignity and manhood of 
Americans. He sneered at those who argued that 
we ought to submit to Great Britain for the sake 
of the protection we got from her. " Great Britain 
will not fail to bring us into a war with some of 
her neighbors, and then protect us as a lawyer 
defends a suit, — the client paying for it. This is 

50 



Independence 51 

quite in form, but a wise man would, I think, get 
rid of the suit and the lawyer together. Again, 
how are we to be protected ? If a descent is made 
upon our coasts and the British navy and army 
are three thousand miles off, we cannot receive 
very great benefit from them on that occasion. 
If, to obviate this inconvenience, we have an army 
and navy constantly among us, who can say that 
we shall not need a little protection against thejjt ? " 
He went on to point out the hopelessness of ex- 
pecting Great Britain to keep to any terms which 
would deprive Parliament of its supremacy over 
America; for no succeeding Parliament could be 
held bound by the legislation of its predecessor, 
and the very acknowledgment of British suprem- 
acy on the part of the Americans would bind them 
as subjects, and make the supremacy of Parlia- 
ment legitimate. He bade his hearers remember 
the maxim "that no faith is to be kept with 
rebels," and said: "In this case, or in any other 
case, if we fancy ourselves hardly dealt with, I 
maintain there is no redress but by arms. For 
it never yet was known that, when men assume 
power, they will part with it again, unless by 
compulsion." 

He then took up the subject of independence; 
showed, for the benefit of the good but timid men 
who were frightened at the mere title, that, in all 
but name, it already existed in New York, and 



52 Gouverneur Morris 

proved that its maintenance was essential to our 
well-being. "My argument, therefore, stands 
thus : As a connection with Great Britain cannot 
again exist without enslaving America, an inde- 
pendence is absolutely necessary. I cannot bal- 
ance between the two. We run a hazard in one 
path, I confess ; but then we are infallibly ruined 
if we pursue the other. . . . We find the 
characteristic marks and insignia of independence 
in this society, considered in itself and compared 
with other societies. The enumeration is con- 
viction. Coining moneys, raising armies, regu- 
lating commerce, peace, war, — all these things you 
are not only adepts in, but masters of. Treaties 
alone remain, and even those you have dabbled at. 
Georgia you put under the ban of empire, and 
received her upon repentance as a member of the 
flock. Canada you are now treating with. France 
and Spain you ought to treat with, and the rest is 
but a name. I believe, sir, the Romans were as 
much governed, or rather oppressed, by their 
emperors, as ever any people were by their king. 
But emperor was more agreeable to their ears 
than king. [So] some, nay, many, persons in 
America dislike the word independence." 

He then went on to show how independence 
would work well alike for our peace, liberty, and 
security. Considering the first, he laughed at the 
apprehensions expressed by some that the moment 



Independence 53 

America was independent all the powers of Europe 
would pounce down on her, to parcel out the coun- 
try among themselves ; and showed clearly that to 
a European power any war of conquest in America 
would be "tedious, expensive, uncertain, and ruin- 
ous," and that none of the coimtry could be kept 
even if it should come to pass that some little 
portion of it were conquered. "But I cannot 
think it will ever come to this. For when I turn 
my eyes to the means of defense, I find them 
amply sufficient. We have all heard that in the 
last war America was conquered in Germany. I 
hold the converse of this to be true, namely, that 
in and by America his majesty's German domin- 
ions were secured. ... I expect a full and 
lasting defense against any and every part of the 
earth." After thus treating of the advantages to 
be hoped for on the score of peace, he turns atten- 
tion "to a question of infinitely greater impor- 
tance, namely, the liberty of this country;" and 
afterward passes to the matter of security, which, 
"so long as the system of laws by which we are 
now governed shall prevail, is amply provided for 
in every separate colony. There may indeed arise 
an objection because some gentlemen suppose that 
the different colonies will carry on a sort of land 
piracy against one another. But how this can 
possibly happen when the idea of separate colonies 
no longer exists I cannot for my soul comprehend. 



54 Gouverneur Morris 

That something very Hke this has already been 
done I shall not deny, but the reason is as evident 
as the fact. We never yet had a government in 
this coiintry of sufficient energy to restrain the 
lawless and indigent. Whenever a form of gov- 
ernment is established which deserves the name, 
these insurrections must cease. But who is the 
man so hardy as to affirm that they will not grow 
with our growth, while on every occasion we must 
resort to an English judicature to terminate dif- 
ferences which the maxims of policy will teach 
them to leave undetermined? By degrees we are 
getting beyond the utmost pale of English govern- 
ment. Settlements are forming to the westward 
of us, whose inhabitants acknowledge no authority 
but their own." In one sentence he showed rather 
a change of heart, as regarded his former aristo- 
cratic leanings ; for he reproached those who were 
"apprehensive of losing a little consequence and 
importance by living in a country where all are on 
an equal footing," and predicted that we should 
"cause all nations to resort hither as an asylum 
from oppression." 

The speech was remarkable for its incisive 
directness and boldness, for the exact clearness 
with which it portrayed things as they were, for 
the broad sense of American nationality that it 
displayed, and for the accurate forecasts that it 
contained as to our future course in certain par- 



Independence 55 

ticulars, — such as freedom from European wars 
and entanglements, a strong but purely defensive 
foreign policy, the encouragement of the growth 
of the West, while keeping it united to us, and the 
throwing open our doors to the oppressed from 
abroad. 

Soon after the delivery of this speech news came 
that the Declaration of Independence had been 
adopted by the Continental Congress; and Jay, 
one of the New York delegates to this body, and 
also a member of the Provincial Congress, drew 
up for the latter a resolution emphatically indors- 
ing the declaration, which was at once adopted 
without a dissenting voice. At the same time the 
Provincial Congress changed its name to that of 
"The Convention of the Representatives of the 
State of New York." 

These last acts were done by a body that had 
been elected, with increased power, to succeed the 
third Provincial Congress and provide for a new 
constitution. Just before this, Morris had been 
sent to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia 
to complain that the troops from New England 
were paid more largely than those from the other 
colonies ; a wrong which was at once redressed, 
the wages of the latter being raised, and Alorris 
returned to New York in triumph after only a 
week's absence. 

The Constitutional Convention of New York led 



56 Gouverneur Morris 

a most checkered life; for the victorious British 
chevied it up and down the State, hunting it in 
turn from every small town in which it thought to 
have found a peaceful haven of refuge. At last it 
rested in Fishkill, such an out-of-the-way place as 
to be free from danger. The members were obliged 
to go armed, so as to protect themselves from stray 
marauding parties; and the niunber of delegates 
in attendance alternately dwindled and swelled in 
a wonderful manner, now resolving themselves 
into a committee of safety, and again resum- 
ing their functions as members of the conven- 
tion. 

The most important duties of the convention 
were entrusted to two committees. Of the first, 
which was to draft a plan for the Constitution, 
Morris, Jay, and Livingston were the three leading 
members, upon whom all the work fell; of the 
second, which was to devise means for the estab- 
lishment of a state fimd, Morris was the chairman 
and moving spirit. 

He was also chairman of a committee which was 
appointed to look after the Tories, and prevent 
them from joining together and rising; and so 
numerous were they that the jails were soon 
choked with those of their number who, on 
account of their prominence or bitterness, were 
most obnoxious to the patriots. Also a partial 
system of confiscation of Tory estates was begun. 



Independence 57 

So greatly were the Tories feared and hated, and 
so determined were the attempts to deprive them 
of even the shadow of a chance to do harm, by so 
much as a word, that the convention sent a 
memorial, drafted by Morris, to the Continental 
Congress, in which they made the very futile sug- 
gestion that it should take "some measures for 
expimging from the Book of Common Prayer such 
parts, and discontinuing in the congregations of 
all other denominations all such prayers, as inter- 
fere with the interests of the American cause." 
The resolution was not acted on ; but another part 
of the memorial shows how the Church of England 
men were standing by the mother country, for it 
goes on to recite that "the enemies of America 
have taken great pains to insinuate into the minds 
of the Episcopalians that the church is in danger. 
We could wish the Congress would pass some 
resolve to quiet their fears, and we are confident 
that it would do essential service to the cause of 
America, at least in this State." 

Morris's position in regard to the Tories was a 
peculiarly hard one, because among their number 
were many of his own relatives, including his elder 
brother. The family house, where his mother 
resided, was within the British lines ; and not only 
did he feel the disapproval of such of his people as 
were loyalists, on the one side, but, on the other, 
his letters to his family caused him to be regarded 



58 Gouverneur Morris 

with suspicion by the baser spirits in the American 
party. About this time one of his sisters died ; 
the letter he then wrote to his mother is in the 
usual formal style of the time, yet it shows marks 
of deep feeling, and he takes occasion, while ad- 
mitting that the result of the war was -uncertain, 
to avow, with a sternness imusual to him, his 
intention to face all things rather than abandon 
the patriot cause. "The worst that can happen 
is to fall on the last bleak mountain of America ; 
and he who dies there in defense of the injured 
rights of mankind is happier than his conqueror, 
more beloved by mankind, more applauded by his 
own heart." The letter closes by a characteristic 
touch, when he sends his love to " such as deserve 
it. The number is not great." 

The committee on the Constitution was not 
ready to report until March, 1777. Then the 
convention devoted itself solely to the considera- 
tion of the report, which, after several weeks' dis- 
cussion, was adopted with very Httle change. Jay 
and Morris led the debate before the convention, 
as they had done previously in committee. There 
was perfect agreement upon the general principles. 
Freehold suffrage was adopted, and a majority of 
the freeholders of the State were thus the ulti- 
mate governing power. The executive, judicial, 
and legislative powers were separated sharply, as 
was done in the other States, and later on in the 



Independence 59 

federal Constitution as well. The legislative body 
was divided into two chambers. 

It was over the executive branch that the main 
contest arose. It was conceded that this should be 
nominally single -headed ; that is, that there should 
be a governor. But the members generally could 
not realize how different was a governor elected 
by the people, and responsible to them, from one 
appointed by an alien and higher power to rule 
over them, as in the colonial days. The remem- 
brance of the contests with the royal governors 
was still fresh; and the mere name of governor 
frightened them. They had the same illogical fear 
of the executive that the demagogues of to-day 
(and some honest but stupid people, as well) pro- 
fess to feel for a standing army. Men often let 
the dread of the shadow of a dead wrong frighten 
them into courting a living evil. 

Morris himself was wonderfully clear-sighted 
and cool-headed. He did not let the memory of 
the wrong-doing of the royal governors blind him ; 
he saw that the trouble with them lay, not in the 
power that they held, but in the source from which 
that power came. Once the source was changed, 
the power was an advantage, not a harm, to the 
State. Yet few or none of his companions could 
see this ; and they nervously strove to save their 
new State from the danger of executive usurpation 
by trying to make the executive practically a 



6o Gouverneur Morris 

board of men instead of one man, and by crippling 
it so as to make it ineffective for good, while at the 
same time dividing the responsibility, so that no 
one need be afraid to do evil. Above all, they 
were anxious to take away from the governor the 
appointment of the military and civil servants of 
the State. 

Morris had persuaded the committee to leave 
the appointment of these officials to the governor, 
the legislature retaining the power of confirmation 
or rejection ; but the convention, under the lead of 
Jay, rejected this proposition, and after some dis- 
cussion adopted in its place the cumbrous and 
foolish plan of a "cotmcil of appointment," to 
consist of the governor and several senators. As 
might have been expected, this artificial body 
worked nothing but harm, and became simply a 
peculiarly odious political machine. 

Again, Morris advocated giving the governor a 
qualified veto over the acts passed by the legis- 
lature ; but instead of such a simple and straight- 
forward method of legislative revision, the con- 
vention saw fit to adopt a companion piece of 
foolishness to the coimcil of appointment, in the 
shape of the equally complicated and anomalous 
council of revision, consisting of the governor, 
chancellor, and judges of the Supreme Court, by 
whom all the acts of the legislature had to be 
revised before they could become laws. It is 



Independence 6i 

marvelous that these two bodies should have lived 
on so long as they did, — over forty years. 

The convention did one most praiseworthy thing 
in deciding in favor of complete religious tolera- 
tion. This seems natural enough now; but at 
that time there was hardly a European state that 
practised it. Great Britain harassed her Catholic 
subjects in a himdred different ways; while in 
France Protestants were treated far worse, and, 
in fact, could scarcely be regarded as having any 
legal standing whatever. On no other one point 
do the statesmen of the Revolution show to more 
marked advantage when compared with their 
European compeers than in this of complete 
religious toleration. Their position was taken, 
too, simply because they deemed it to be the right 
and proper one ; they had nothing to fear or hope 
from Catholics, and their own interests were in no 
wise advanced by what they did in the matter. 

But in the New York convention toleration was 
not obtained without a fight. There always ran- 
kled in Jay's mind the memory of the terrible 
cruelty wrought by Catholics on his Huguenot 
forefathers ; and he introduced into the article on 
toleration an appendix, which discriminated 
against the adherents of the Church of Rome, 
denying them the rights of citizenship until they 
should solemnly swear before the Supreme Court, 
first, "that they verily believe in their conscience 



62 Gouverneur Morris 

that no pope, priest, or foreign authority on earth 
has power to absolve the subjects of this State 
from their allegiance to the same;" and, second, 
" that they renounce . . . the dangerous and 
damnable doctrine that the Pope or any other 
earthly authority has power to absolve men from 
sins described in and prohibited by the Holy 
Gospel." This second point, however important, 
was of purely theological interest, and had abso- 
lutely nothing to do with the state Constitution ; 
as to the first proposition, it might have been 
proper enough had there been the least chance of 
a conflict between the Pope, either in his temporal 
or his ecclesiastical capacity, and the United 
States ; but as there was no possibility of such a 
conflict arising, and as, if it did arise, there would 
not be the slightest danger of the United States 
receiving any damage, to put the sentence in would 
have been not only useless, but exceedingly foolish 
and harmful, on account of the intense irritation 
it would have excited. 

The whole clause was rejected by a two to one 
vote, and then all the good that it aimed at was 
accomplished by the adoption, on the motion of 
Morris, of a proviso that the toleration granted 
should not be held to "justify practices incon- 
sistent with the peace and safety of this State." 
This proviso of Morris remains in the Constitution 
to this day; and thus, while absolute religious 



Independence 63 

liberty is guaranteed, the State reserves to itself 
full right of protection, if necessary, against the 
adherents of any religious body, foreign or domes- 
tic, if they menace the public safety. 

On a question even more important than reli- 
gious toleration, namely, the abolition of domestic 
slavery. Jay and Morris fought side by side ; but 
though the more enlightened of their fellow mem- 
bers went with them, they were a little too much 
in advance of the age, and failed. They made 
every effort to have a clause introduced into the 
Constitution recommending to the future legisla- 
ture of New York to abolish slavery as soon as it 
could be done consistently with the public safety 
and the rights of property; "so that in future 
ages every human being who breathes the air of 
this State shall enjoy the privileges of a free man." 
Although they failed in their immediate purpose, 
yet they had much hearty support, and by the 
bold stand they took and the high ground they 
occupied they undoubtedly brought nearer the 
period when the abolition of slavery in New York 
became practicable. 

The Constitution was fiaally adopted by the 
convention almost unanimously, and went into 
effect forthwith, as there was no ratification by 
the people at large. 

As soon as it was adopted, a committee, which in- 
cluded Morris, Jay, and Livingston, was appointed 



64 Gouverneur Morris 

to start and organize the new government. The 
courts of justice were speedily put in running 
order, and thus one of the most crying evils that 
affected the State was remedied, A council of 
safety of fifteen members — again including Morris 
— was established to act as the provincial gov- 
ernment, imtil the regular legislature should con- 
vene. An election for governor was also held 
almost immediately, and Clinton was chosen. He 
was then serving in the field, where he had done 
good work, and, together with his brother James, 
had fought with the stubborn valor that seems to 
go with Anglo-Irish blood. He did not give up his 
command xmtil several months after he was 
elected, although meanwhile keeping up constant 
communication with the Coimcil of Safety, 
through whom he acted in matters of state. 

Meanwhile Burgoyne, with his eight or nine 
thousand troops, excellently drilled British and 
Hessians, assisted by Tories, Canadians, and In- 
dians, had crossed the northern frontier, and was 
moving down toward the heart of the already 
disorganized State, exciting the wildest panic and 
confusion. The Council of Safety hardly knew 
how to act, and finally sent a committee of two, 
Morris being one, to the headquarters of General 
Schuyler, who had the supreme command over all 
the troops in the northern part of New York. 

On Morris's arrival he foimd affairs at a very 



■i 



George Clinton 



^'^'^ 





I 



Independence 65 

low ebb, and at once wrote to describe this con- 
dition to the president of the Council of Safety. 
Burgoyne's army had come steadily on. He first 
destroyed Arnold's flotilla on Lake Champlain. 
Then he captured the forts along the Lakes, and 
utterly wrecked the division of the American army 
that had been told off to defend them, imder the 
very imfortunate General St. Clair. He was now 
advancing through the great reaches of wooded 
wilderness toward the head of the Hudson. Schuy- 
ler, a general of fair capacity, was doing what he 
could to hold the enemy back ; but his one efficient 
supporter was the wilderness itself, through which 
the British army stumbled painfully along. Schuy- 
ler had in all less than five thousand men, half of 
them short service Continental troops, the other 
half militia. The farmers would not turn out 
until after harvest home ; all the bodies of militia, 
especially those from New England, were very 
insubordinate and of most fickle temper, and 
could not be depended on for any sustained con- 
test; as an example. Stark, under whose nominal 
command the northern New Englanders won the 
battle of Bennington, actually marched off his 
whole force the day before the battle of Stillwater, 
alleging the expiration of the term of service of 
his soldiers as an excuse for what looked like gross 
treachery or cowardice, but was probably merely 
sheer selfish wrong-headedness and mean jealousy. 
5 



66 Gouverneur Morris 

Along the Mohawk valley the dismay was extreme, 
and the militia could not be got out at all. Jay 
was so angered by the abject terror in this quarter 
that he advised leaving the inhabitants to shift for 
themselves ; sound advice, too, for when the pinch 
came and they were absolutely forced to take 
arms, they did very fairly at Oriskany. It was 
even feared that the settlers of the region which 
afterward became Vermont would go over to the 
enemy; still, time and space were in our favor, 
and Morris was quite right when he said in his first 
letter (dated July i6, 1777): "Upon the whole I 
think we shall do very well, but this opinion is 
founded merely upon the barriers which nature 
has raised against all access from the northward." 
As he said of himself, he was "a good gtiesser." 

He outlined the plan which he thought the 
Americans should follow. This was to harass the 
British in every way, without risking a stand-up 
fight, while laying waste the country through 
which they were to pass so as to render it impos- 
sible for an army to subsist on it. For the militia 
he had the most hearty contempt, writing: "Three 
hundred of the militia of Massachusetts Bay went 
off this morning, in spite of the opposition — we 
should have said, entreaties — of their officers. 
All the militia on the groimd are so heartily tired, 
and so extremely desirous of getting home, that it 
is more than probable that none of them will 



Independence 67 

remain here ten days longer. One half was dis- 
charged two days ago, to silence, if possible, their 
clamor ; and the remainder, officers excepted, will 
soon discharge themselves." 

The Council of Safety grew so nervous over the 
outlook that their letters became fairly querulous ; 
and they not imnaturally asked Morris to include 
in his letters some paragraphs that could be given 
to the public. To this that rather quick-tempered 
gentleman took exceptions, and replied caustically 
in his next letter, the opening paragraph being: 
"We have received yours of the 19th, which has 
afforded us great pleasure, since we are enabled in 
some measure to collect from it our errand to the 
northward, one of the most important objects of 
our journey being, in the opinion of your honor- 
able body, to write the news," and he closes by 
stating that he shall come back to wait upon them, 
and learn their pleasure, at once. 

Meanwhile the repeated disasters in the North 
had occasioned much clamor against Schuyler, 
who, if not a brilliant general, had still done what 
he could in very trying circumstances, and was in 
nowise responsible for the various mishaps that 
had occurred. The New England members of 
Congress, always jealous of New York, took advan- 
tage of this to begin intriguing against him, under 
the lead of Roger Sherman and others, and finally 
brought about his replacement by Gates, a much 



68 Gouverneur Morris 

inferior man, with no capacity whatever for com- 
mand. Morris and Jay both took up Schuyler's 
cause very warmly, seeing clearly, in the first 
place, that the disasters were far from ruinous, 
and that a favorable outcome was probable ; and, 
in the second place, that it was the people them- 
selves who were to blame and not Schuyler. They 
went on to Philadelphia to speak for him, but they 
arrived just a day too late, Gates having been 
appointed twenty-four hours previous to their 
coming. 

When Gates reached his army the luck had 
already begun to turn. Burgoyne's outlying par- 
ties had been destroyed, his Indians and Canadians 
had left him, he had been disappointed in his hopes 
of a Tory uprising in his favor, and, hampered by 
his baggage -train, he had been brought almost to 
a standstill in the tangled wilds through which 
he had slowly plowed his way. Schuyler had 
done what he could to hinder the foe's progress, 
and had kept his own army together as a rallying 
point for the militia, who, having gathered in their 
harvests, and being inspirited by the outcome of 
the fights at Oriskany and Bennington, flocked in 
by hundreds to the American standard. Gates 
himself did Hterally nothing; he rather hindered 
his men than otherwise ; and the latter were tur- 
bulent and prone to disobey orders. But they 
were now in fine feather for fighting, and there 



Independence 69 

were plenty of them. So Gates merely sat still, 
and the levy of backwoods farmers, all good indi- 
vidual fighters, and with some excellent brigade 
and regimental commanders, such as Arnold and 
Morgan, fairly mobbed to death the smaller num- 
ber of dispirited and poorly led regulars against 
whom they were pitted. When the latter were at 
last fought out and forced to give in, Gates allowed 
them much better terms than he should have 
done ; and the Continental Congress, to its shame, 
snatched at a technicality, imder cover of which to 
break the faith plighted through its general, and 
to avoid fulfilling the conditions to which he had 
so foolishly agreed. 

Morris and Jay, though unable to secure the 
retention of Schuyler, had, nevertheless, by their 
representations while at Philadelphia, prevailed on 
the authorities largely to reinforce the army which 
was about to be put under Gates. Morris was 
very angry at the intrigue by which the latter had 
been given the command ; but what he was espe- 
cially aiming at was the success of the cause, not 
the advancement of his friends. Once Gates was 
appointed he did all in his power to strengthen 
him, and, with his usual clear-sightedness, he pre- 
dicted his ultimate success. 

Schuyler was a man of high character and public 
spirit, and he behaved really nobly in the midst 
of his disappointment; his conduct throughout 



70 Gouverneur Morris 

affording a very striking contrast to that of 
McClellan, under somewhat similar circumstances 
in the Civil War. Morris wrote him, sympathizing 
with him, and asking him to sink all personal feel- 
ing and devote his energies to the commonweal of 
the coimtry while out of power just as strenuously 
as he had done when in command. Schuyler re- 
sponded that he should continue to serve his coun- 
try as zealously as before, and he made his words 
good; but Gates was jealous of the better man 
whose downfall he had been the instrument of 
accomplishing, and declined to profit by his help. 
In a later letter to Schuyler, written September 
1 8, 1777, Morris praised the latter very warmly for 
the way he had behaved, and commented roughly 
on Gates's littleness of spirit. He considered that 
with such a commander there was nothing to be 
hoped for from skilful management, and that Bur- 
goyne would have to be simply tired out. Allud- 
ing to a rumor that the Indians were about to take 
up the hatchet for us, he wrote, in the humorous 
vein he adopted so often in dealing even with the 
most pressing matters: " If this be true, it would 
be infinitely better to wear away the enemy's army 
by a scrupulous and polite attention, than to vio- 
late the rules of decorum and the laws of hospi- 
tality by making an attack upon strangers in our 
own country!" He gave Schuyler the news of 
Washington's defeat at the battle of Brandywine, 



Independence 71 

and foretold the probable loss of Philadelphia and 
a consequent winter campaign. 

In ending he gave a thoroughly characteristic 
sketch of the occupations of himself and his col- 
leagues. "The chief justice (Jay) is gone to 
fetch his wife. The chancellor (Livingston) is 
solacing himself with his wife, his farm, and his 
imagination. Our Senate is doing, I know not 
what. In Assembly we wrangle long to little 
purpose. . . . We have some principles of 
fermentation which must, if it be possible, evapo- 
rate before business is entered upon." 



CHAPTER IV. 

IN THE CONTINENTAL CONGRESS. 

AT the end of 1777, while still but twenty- 
five years old, Morris was elected to the 
Continental Congress, and took his seat in 
that body at Yorktown in the following January. 

He was immediately appointed as one of a com- 
mittee of five members to go to Washington's 
headquarters at Valley Forge and examine into 
the condition of the Continental troops. 

The dreadful suffering of the American army in 
this winter camp was such that its memory has 
literally eaten its way into the hearts of our 
people, and it comes before our minds with a vivid- 
ness that dims the remembrance of any other 
disaster. Washington's gaunt, half-starved Con- 
tinentals, shoeless and ragged, shivered in their 
crazy huts, worn out by want and illness, and by 
the bitter cold ; while the members of the Conti- 
nental Congress not only failed to support them in 
the present, but even grudged them the poor gift 
of a promise of half -pay in the future. Some of 
the delegates, headed by Samuel Adams, were 
actually caballing against the great chief himself, 
the one hope of America. Meanwhile the States 
looked askance at each other, and each sunk into 

72 



In the Continental Congress 73 

supine indifference when its own borders were 
for the moment left unthreatened by the foe. 
Throughout the Revolutionary War our people 
hardly once pulled with a will together ; although 
almost every locality in turn, on some one occasion, 
varied its lethargy by a spasm of terrible energy. 
Yet, again, it must be remembered that we were 
never more to be dreaded than when our last hope 
seemed gone ; and if the people were unwilling to 
show the wisdom and self-sacrifice that would have 
insured success, they were equally determined 
under no circumstances whatever to acknowledge 
final defeat. 

To Jay, with whom he was always intimate, 
Morris wrote in strong terms from Valley Forge, 
painting things as they were, but without a shadow 
of doubt or distrust; for he by this time saw 
clearly enough that in American warfare the 
darkest hour was often followed close indeed by 
dawn. "The skeleton of an army presents itself 
to our eyes in a naked, starving condition, out of 
health, out of spirits. But I have seen Fort 
George in 1777." The last sentence refers to what 
he saw of Schuyler's forces, when affairs in New 
York State were at the blackest, just before the 
tide began to turn against Burgoyne. He then 
went on to beseech Jay to exert himself to the 
utmost on the great question of taxation, the most 
vital of all. Morris himself was so good a financier 



74 Gouverneur Morris 

that Revolutionary financial economics drove him 
almost wild. The Continental Congress, of which 
he had just become a member, he did not esteem 
very highly, and dismissed it, as well as the cur- 
rency, as having "both depreciated." The State 
of Pennsylvania, he remarked, was "sick unto 
death ;" and added that " Sir WiUiam [the British 
general] would prove a most damnable physician," 

Most wisely, in examining and reporting, he 
paid heed almost exclusively to Washington's 
recommendations, and the plan he and his col- 
leagues produced was little more than an enlarge- 
ment of the general's suggestions as to filling 
out the regiments, regulating rank, modeling the 
various departments, etc. In fact, Morris now 
devoted himself to securing the approval of Con- 
gress for Washington's various plans. 

In urging one of the most important of these he 
encountered very determined opposition. Wash- 
ington was particularly desirous of securing a per- 
manent provision for the officers by the establish- 
ment of a system of half -pay, stating that without 
some such arrangement he saw no hope whatever 
for the salvation of the cause ; for as things then 
were the officers were leaving day by day ; and of 
those who went home on furlough to the Eastern 
and Southern States, many, instead of returning, 
went into some lucrative employment. This fact, 
by the way, while showing the difficulties with 



In the Continental Congress 75 

which Washington had to deal, and therefore his 
greatness, since he successfully dealt with them, at 
the same time puts the officers of the Revolution 
in no very favorable light as compared with their 
descendants at the time of the great rebellion; 
and the Continental Congress makes a still worse 
showing. 

When Morris tried to push through a measure 
providing for half -pay for life, he was fought, tooth 
and nail, by many of his colleagues, including, to 
their lasting discredit be it said, every delegate 
from New England. The folly of these ultra- 
democratic delegates almost passes belief. They 
seemed incapable of learning how the fight for lib- 
erty should be made. Their leaders, like Samuel 
Adams and John Hancock, did admirable service 
in exciting the Americans to make the struggle; 
but once it was begun, their function ended, and 
from thence onward they hampered almost as 
much as they helped the patriot cause. New Eng- 
land, too, had passed through the period when its 
patriotic fervor was at white heat. It still re- 
mained as resolute as ever ; and if the danger had 
been once more brought home to its very door-sill, 
then it would have risen again as it had risen 
before; but without the spur of an immediate 
necessity it moved but sluggishly. 

The New Englanders were joined by the South 
Carolina delegates. Morris was backed by the 



76 Gouverneur Morris 

members from New York, Virginia, and the other 
States, and he won the victory, but not without 
being obhged to accept amendments that took 
away some of the good of the measure. Half -pay 
was granted, but it was only to last for seven years 
after the close of the war ; and the paltry bounty 
of eighty dollars was to be given to every soldier 
who served out his time to the end. 

At the same period Morris was engaged on 
numerous other committees, dealing chiefly with 
the finances, or with the remedy of abuses that had 
crept into the administration of the army. In one 
of his reports he exposed thoroughly the frightful 
waste in the purchase and distribution of supplies, 
and, what was much worse, the accompanying 
frauds. These frauds had become a most serious 
evil; Jay, in one of his letters to Morris, had 
already urgently requested him to turn his atten- 
tion especially to stopping the officers, in par- 
ticular those of the staff, from themselves engaging 
in trade, on accoimt of the jobbing and swindling 
that it produced. The shoddy contractors of the 
Civil War had plenty of predecessors in the Revo- 
lution. 

When these events occurred, in the spring of 
1778, it was already three years after the fight at 
Lexington; certainly, the Continental armies of 
that time do not compare favorably, even taking 
all difficulties into account, with the Confederate 



In the Continental Congress 77 

forces which in 1864, three years after the fall of 
Sumter, fronted Grant and Sherman. The men 
of the Revolution failed to show the capacity to 
organize for fighting purposes, and the ability to 
bend all energies toward the attainment of a given 
end, which their great-grandsons of the Civil War, 
both at the North and the South, possessed. Yet, 
after all, their very follies sprang from their vir- 
tues, from their inborn love of freedom, and their 
impatience of the control of outsiders. So fierce 
had they been in their opposition to the rule of 
foreigners that they were now hardly willing to 
submit to being ruled by themselves; they had 
seen power so abused that they feared its very use ; 
they were anxious to assert their independence of 
all mankind, even of each other. Stubborn, 
honest, and fearless, they were taught with diffi- 
culty, and only by the grinding logic of an impe- 
rious necessity, that it was no surrender of their 
freedom to submit to rulers chosen by themselves, 
through whom alone that freedom could be won. 
They had not yet learned that right could be 
enforced only by might, that union was to the full 
as important as liberty, because it was the pre- 
requisite condition for the establishment and 
preservation of liberty. 

But if the Americans of the Revolution were 
not perfect, how their faults dwindle when we 
stand them side by side with their European 



78 Gouverneur Morris 

compeers ! What European nation then brought 
forth rulers as wise and pure as our statesmen, or 
masses as free and self-respecting as our people ? 
There was far more swindling, jobbing, cheating, 
and stealing in the English army than in ours ; the 
British king and his ministers need no criticism; 
and the outcome of the war proves that their 
nation as a whole was less resolute than our own. 
As for the other European powers, the faults of 
our leaders sink out of sight when matched against 
the ferocious frivolity of the French noblesse, or 
the ignoble, sordid, bloody baseness of those 
swinish German kinglets who let out their subjects 
to do hired murder, and battened on the blood and 
sweat of the wretched beings under them, imtil 
the whirlwind of the French Revolution swept 
their carcasses from off the world they cumbered. 
We must needs give all honor to the men who 
founded our Commonwealth ; only in so doing let 
us remember that they brought into being a gov- 
ernment under which their children were to grow 
better and not worse. 

Washington at once recognized in Morris a man 
whom he could trust in every way, and on whose 
help he could rely in other matters besides getting 
his officers half -pay. The young New Yorker was 
one of the great Virginian's warmest supporters 
in Congress, and took the lead in championing his 



In the Continental Congress 79 

cause at every turn. He was the leader in putting 
down intrigues like that of the French-Irish adven- 
turer Conway, his ready tongue and knowledge of 
parliamentary tactics, no less than his ability, ren- 
dering him the especial dread and dislike of the 
anti-Washington faction. 

Washington wrote to Morris very freely, and in 
one of his letters complained of the conduct of 
some of the officers who wished to resign when 
affairs looked dark, and to be reinstated as soon as 
they brightened a little. Morris replied with one 
of his bright, caustic letters, sparing his associates 
very little, their pompous tediousness and hesita- 
tion being peculiarly galling to a man so far-seeing 
and so prompt to make up his mind. He wrote : 
"We are going on with the regimental arrange- 
ments as fast as possible, and I think the day 
begins to appear with respect to that business. 
Had our Saviour addressed a chapter to the rulers 
of mankind, as He did many to the subjects, I am 
persuaded His good sense would have dictated this 
text: Be not wise overmuch. Had the several 
members who compose our multifarious body been 
only wise enough, our business would long since 
have been completed. But our superior abilities, 
or the desire of appearing to possess them, lead us 
to such exquisite tediousness of debate that the 
most precious moments pass unheeded away. . . . 
As to what you mention of the extraordinary 



8o Gouverneur Morris 

demeanor of some gentlemen, I cannot but agree 
with you that such conduct is not the most hon- 
orable. But, on the other hand, you must allow- 
that it is the most safe, and certainly you are not 
to learn that, however ignorant of that happy art 
in your own person, the bulk of us bipeds know 
well how to balance solid pudding against empty 
praise. There are other things, my dear sir, 
beside virtue, which are their own reward.'' 

Washington chose Morris as his confidential 
friend and agent to bring privately before Con- 
gress a matter in reference to which he did not 
consider it politic to write publicly. He was at 
that time annoyed beyond measure by the shoals 
of foreign officers who were seeking employment 
in the army, and he wished Congress to stop 
giving them admission to the service. These for- 
eign officers were sometimes honorable men, but 
more often adventurers ; with two or three striking 
exceptions, they failed to do as well as officers of 
native birth ; and, as later in the Civil War, so in 
the Revolution, it appeared that Americans could 
be best commanded by Americans. Washington 
had the greatest dislike for these adventurers, 
stigmatizing them as "men who in the first in- 
stance tell you that they wish for nothing more 
than the honor of serving in so glorious a cause as 
volimteers, the next day solicit rank without pay, 
the day following want money advanced to them, 



In the Continental Congress 8i 

and in the course of a week want further promo- 
tion, and are not satisfied with anything you can 
do for them." He ended by writing: " I do most 
devoutly wish that we had not a single foreigner 
among us, except the Marquis de Lafayette, who 
acts upon very different principles from those 
which govern the rest." To Lafayette, indeed, 
America owes as much as to any of her own chil- 
dren, for his devotion to us was as disinterested 
and sincere as it was effective ; and it is a pleasant 
thing to remember that we, in our turn, not only 
repaid him materially, but, what he valued far 
more, that our whole people yielded him all his 
life long the most loving homage a man could 
receive. No man ever kept pleasanter relations 
with a people he had helped than Lafayette did 
with us. 

Morris replied to Washington that he would do 
all in his power to aid him. Meanwhile he had 
also contracted a very warm friendship for Greene, 
then newly appointed quartermaster-general of the 
army, and proved a most useful ally, both in and 
out of Congress, in helping the general to get his 
department in good rimning order, and in extricat- 
ing it from the frightful confusion in which it had 
previously been plunged. 

He also specially devoted himself at this time to 
an investigation of the finances, which were in a 
dreadful condition ; and by the ability with which 

6 



82 Gouverneur Morris 

he performed his very varied duties he acquired 
such prominence that he was given the chairman- 
ship of the most important of all the congressional 
committees. This was the committee to which was 
confided the task of conferring with the British 
commissioners, who had been sent over, in the 
spring of 1778, to treat with the Americans, in 
accordance with the terms of what were known as 
Lord North's conciliatory bihs. These bills were 
two in number, the first giving up the right of 
taxation, about which the quarrel had originally 
arisen, and the second authorizing the commis- 
sioners to treat with the revolted colonies on all 
questions in dispute. They were introduced in 
Parliament on account of the little headway made 
by the British in subduing their former subjects, 
and were pressed hastily through because of the 
fear of an American alliance with France, which 
was then, indeed, almost concluded. 

Three years before, these bills would have 
achieved their end ; but now they came by just 
that much time too late. The embittered warfare 
had lasted long enough entirely to destroy the old 
friendly feelings ; and the Americans having once 
tasted the "perilous pleasure" of freedom, having 
once stretched out their arms and stood before the 
world's eyes as their own masters, it was certain 
that they would never forego their liberty, no 
matter with what danger it was fraught, no matter 



In the Continental Congress 83 

how light the yoke, or how kindly the bondage, by 
which it was to be replaced. 

Two days after the bills were received, Morris 
drew up and presented his report, which was unan- 
imously adopted by Congress. Its tenor can be 
gathered from its summing up, which declared that 
the indispensable preliminaries to any treaty would 
have to be the withdrawal of all the British fleets 
and armies, and the acknowledgment of the inde- 
pendence of the United States; and it closed by 
calling on the several States to furnish without 
delay their quotas of troops for the coming cam- 
paign. 

This decisive stand was taken when America 
was still without allies in the contest ; but ten days 
afterward messengers came to Congress bearing 
copies of the treaty with France. It was ratified 
forthwith, and again Morris was appointed chair- 
man of a committee, this time to issue an address 
on the subject to the American people at large. 
He penned this address himself, explaining fully 
the character of the crisis, and going briefly over 
the events that had led to it; and shortly after- 
ward he drew up, on behalf of Congress, a sketch 
of all the proceedings in reference to the British 
commissioners, under the title of "Observations 
on the American Revolution," giving therein a 
masterly outline not only of the doings of Congress 
in the particular matter under consideration, but 



84 Gouverneur Morris 

also an account of the causes of the war, of the 
efforts of the Americans to maintain peace, and of 
the chief events that had taken place, as well as a 
comparison between the contrasting motives and 
aims of the contestants. 

Morris was one of the committee appointed to 
receive the French minister, M. Gerard. Immedi- 
ately afterward he was also selected by Congress 
to draft the instructions which were to be sent to 
Franklin, the American minister at the court of 
Versailles. As a token of the closeness of our 
relations with France, he was requested to show 
these instructions to M. Gerard, which he accord- 
ingly did; and some interesting features of the 
conversation between the two men have been pre- 
served for us in the despatches of Gerard to the 
French court. The Americans were always anx- 
ious to undertake the conquest of Canada, although 
Washington did not beHeve the scheme feasible; 
and the French strongly, although secretly, op- 
posed it, as it was their poHcy from the beginning 
that Canada should remain English. Naturally 
the French did not wish to see America trans- 
formed into a conquering power, a menace to 
themselves and to the Spaniards as well as to the 
EngHsh ; nor can they be criticized for feeling in 
this way, or taimted with acting only from motives 
of self-interest. It is doubtless true that their 
purposes in going into the war were mixed ; they 



In the Continental Congress 85 



unquestionably wished to benefit themselves, and 
to hurt their old and successful rival; but it is 
equally unquestionable that they were also moved 
by a generous spirit of sympathy and admiration 
for the struggling colonists. It would, however, 
have been folly to let this sympathy blind them to 
the consequences that might ensue to all Euro- 
peans having possessions in America, if the Ameri- 
cans should become not only independent, but 
also aggressive; and it was too much to expect 
them to be so far-sighted as to see that, once 
independent, it was against the very nature of 
things that the Americans should 7iot be aggres- 
sive, and impossible that they should be aught 
but powerful and positive instruments, both in 
their own persons and by their example, in freeing 
the whole western continent from European con- 
trol. 

Accordingly M. Gerard endeavored, though 
without success, to prevail on Morris not to men- 
tion the question of an invasion of Canada in the 
instructions to Franklin. He also warned the 
American of the danger of alarming Spain by 
manifesting a wish to encroach on its territory in 
the Mississippi valley, mentioning and condemn- 
ing the attitude taken by several members of Con- 
gress to the effect that the navigation of the 
]\Iississippi should belong equally to the English 
and the Americans. 



86 Gouverneur Morris 

Morris's reply showed how little even the most 
intelHgent American of that time — especially if he 
came from the Northern or Eastern States — could 
appreciate the destiny of his cotintry. He stated 
that his colleagues favored restricting the growth 
of our country to the south and west, and believed 
that the navigation of the Mississippi, from the 
Ohio down, should belong exclusively to the Span- 
iards, as otherwise the western settlements spring- 
ing up in the valley of the Ohio, and on the shores 
of the Great Lakes, would not only domineer over 
Spain, but also over the United States, and would 
certainly render themselves independent in the 
end. He further said that some at least of those 
who were anxious to secure the navigation of the 
Mississippi were so from interested motives, 
having money ventures in the establishments 
along the river. However, if he at this time 
failed fully to grasp his country's future, he was, 
later on, one of the first in the Northern States to 
recognize it ; and once he did see it he promptly 
changed, and became the strongest advocate of 
our territorial expansion. 

Accompanying his instructions to Franklin, 
Morris sent a pamphlet entitled " Observations on 
the Finances of America," to be laid before the 
French ministry. Practically, all that the pam- 
phlet amounted to was a most urgent begging 
letter, showing that our own people could not, or 



In the Continental Congress 87 

would not, either pay taxes or take up a domestic 
loan, so that we stood in dire need of a subsidy 
from abroad. The drawing up of such a docu- 
ment could hardly have been satisfactory employ- 
ment for a high-spirited man who wished to be 
proud of his country. 

All through our negotiations with France and 
England, Morris's views coincided with those of 
Washington, Hamilton, Jay, and the others who 
afterward became leaders of the FederaHst party. 
Their opinions were well expressed by Jay in a 
letter to Morris written about this time, which 
ran: "I view a return to the domination of 
Britain with horror, and would risk all for inde- 
pendence; but that point ceded, . . . the destruc- 
tion of Old England would hurt me; I wish it 
well; it afforded my ancestors an asylum from 
persecution." The rabid American adherents of 
France could not understand such sentiments, and 
the more mean-spirited among them always tried 
to injure Morris on account of his loyalist rela- 
tives, although so many families were divided in 
this same way, Franklin's only son being himself 
a prominent Tory. So bitter was this feeling 
that when, later on, Morris's mother, who was 
within the British lines, became very ill, he actu- 
ally had to give up his intended visit to her, 
because of the furious clamor that was raised 
against it. He refers bitterly, in one of his letters 



88 Gouverneur Morris 

to Jay, to the "malevolence of individuals," as 
something he had to expect, but which he an- 
nounced that he would conquer by so living as to 
command the respect of those whose respect was 
worth having. 

When, however, his foes were of sufficient im- 
portance to warrant his paying attention to them 
individually, Morris proved abimdantly able to 
take care of himself, and to deal heavier blows 
than he received. This was shown in the con- 
troversy which convulsed Congress over the con- 
duct of Silas Deane, the original American envoy 
to France. Deane did not behave very well, but 
at first he was certainly much more sinned against 
than sinning, and Morris took up his cause warmly. 
Thomas Paine, the famous author of "Common 
Sense," who was secretary of the Committee of 
Foreign Affairs, attacked Deane and his de- 
fenders, as well as the court of France, with 
peculiar venom, using as weapons the secrets he 
became acquainted with through his official posi- 
tion, and which he was in honor bound not to 
divulge. For this Morris had him removed from 
his secretaryship, and in the debate handled him 
extremely roughly, characterizing him with con- 
temptuous severity as "a mere adventurer from 
England . . . ignorant even of grammar," and 
ridiculing his pretensions to importance. Paine 
was an adept in the art of invective ; but he came 



In the Continental Congress 89 

out second best in this encounter, and never forgot 
or forgave his antagonist. 

As a rule, however, Morris was kept too busily 
at work to spare time for altercations. He was 
chairman of three important standing committees, 
those on the commissary, quartermaster's, and 
medical departments, and did the whole business 
for each. He also had more than his share of 
special committee work, besides playing his full 
part in the debates and consultations of the Con- 
gress itself. Moreover, his salary was so small 
that he had to eke it out by the occasional prac- 
tice of his profession. He devoted himself espe- 
cially to the consideration of our finances and of 
our foreign relations ; and, as he grew constantly 
to possess more and more weight and influence in 
Congress, he was appointed, early in 1779, as chair- 
man of a very important committee, which was to 
receive commimications from our ministers abroad, 
as well as from the French envoy. He drew out 
its report, together with the draft of instructions 
to our foreign ministers, which it recommended. 
Congress accepted the first, and adopted the last, 
without change, whereby it became the basis of 
the treaty by which we finally won peace. In his 
draft he had been careful not to bind down our 
representatives on minor points, and to leave 
them as large liberty of action as was possible ; but 
the main issues, such as the boundaries, the 



90 Gouverneur Morris 

navigation of the Mississippi, and the fisheries, 
were discussed at length and in order. 

At the time this draft of instructions for a treaty 
was sent out, there was much demand among cer- 
tain members in Congress that we should do all in 
our power to make foreign alliances, and to pro- 
cure recognitions of our independence in every 
possible quarter. To this Morris was heartily 
opposed, deeming that this "rage for treaties," as 
he called it, was not very dignified on our part. 
He held rightly that our true course was to go our 
own gait, without seeking outside favor, until we 
had shown ourselves able to keep our own place 
among nations, when the recognitions would come 
without asking. Whether European nations rec- 
ognized us as a free people, or not, was of Httle 
moment so long as we ourselves Imew that we had 
become one in law and in fact, through the right 
of battle and the final arbitrament of the sword. 

Besides these questions of national policy, Morris 
also had to deal with an irritating matter affecting 
mainly New York. This was the dispute of that 
State with the people of Vermont, who wished to 
form a separate commonwealth of their own, while 
New York claimed that their lands came within its 
borders. Even the fear of their common foe, the 
British, against whom they needed to employ their 
utmost strength, was barely sufficient to prevent 
the two communities from indulging in a small 



In the Continental Congress 91 

civil war of their own; and they persisted in 
pressing their rival claims upon the attention of 
Congress, and clamoring for a decision from that 
harassed and overburdened body. Clinton, who 
was much more of a politician than a statesman, 
led the popular party in this foolish business, the 
majority of the New Yorkers being apparently 
nearly as enthusiastic in asserting their sover- 
eignty over Vermont as they were in declaring 
their independence of Britain. Morris, however, 
was very half-hearted in pushing the affair before 
Congress. He doubted if Congress had the power, 
and he knew it lacked the will, to move in the 
matter at all ; and besides he did not sympathize 
with the position taken by his State. He was 
wise enough to see that the Vermonters had much 
of the right on their side in addition to the great 
fact of possession ; and that New York would be 
probably tmable to employ force enough to con- 
quer them. Clinton was a true type of the sepa- 
ratist or states '-rights politician of that day: he 
cared little how the national weal was affected by 
the quarrel; and he was far more anxious to 
bluster than to fight over the matter, to which 
end he kept besieging the delegates in Congress 
with useless petitions. In a letter to him, Morris 
put the case with his usual plainness, telling him 
that it was perfectly idle to keep worrying Con- 
gress to take action, for it would certainly not do 



92 Gouverneur Morris 

so, and, if it did render a decision, the Vermonters 
would no more respect it than they would the 
Pope's Bull. He went on to show his character- 
istic contempt for half measures, and capacity for 
striking straight at the root of things: "Either 
let these people alone, or conquer them. I prefer 
the latter; but I doubt the means. If we have 
the means let them be used, and let Congress 
deliberate and decide, or deliberate without decid- 
ing, — it is of no consequence. Success will sanc- 
tify every operation. ... If we have not the 
means of conquering these people we must let 
them alone. We must continue our impotent 
threats, or we must make a treaty. ... If we 
continue our threats they will either hate or 
despise us, and perhaps both. ... On the whole, 
then, my conclusion is here, as on most other 
human affairs, act decisively, fight or submit, — 
conquer or treat." Morris was right ; the treaty 
was finally made, and Vermont became an inde- 
pendent State. 

But the small politicians of New York would 
not forgive him for the wisdom and the broad 
feeling of nationality he showed on this and so 
many other questions; and they defeated him 
when he was a candidiate for reelection to Con- 
gress at the end of 1779. The charge they urged 
against him was that he devoted his time wholly 
to the service of the nation at large, and not to 



In the Continental Congress 93 

that of New York in particular ; his very devotion 
to the pubHc business, which had kept him from 
returning to the State, being brought forward to 
harm him. Arguments of this kind are common 
enough even at the present day, and effective too, 
among that numerous class of men with narrow 
minds and selfish hearts. Many an able and 
upright congressman since Morris has been sacri- 
ficed because his constituents found he was fitted 
to do the exact work needed ; because he showed 
himself capable of serving the whole nation, and 
did not devote his time to advancing the interests 
of only a portion thereof. 



H 



CHAPTER V. 

finances: the treaty of peace. 

AT the end of 1779 Morris was thus retired to 
private life ; and, having by this time made 
many friends in Philadelphia, he took up 
his abode in that city. His leaving Congress was 
small loss to himself, as that body was rapidly 
sinking into a condition of windy decrepitude. 

He at once began working at his profession, 
and also threw himself with eager zest into every 
attainable form of gayety and amusement, for he 
was of a most pleasure-loving temperament, very 
fond of society, and a great favorite in the little 
American world of wit and fashion. But although 
in private life, he nevertheless kept his grip on 
public affairs, and devoted himself to the finances, 
which were in a most wretched state. He could 
not keep out of public life; he probably agreed 
with Jay, who, on hearing that he was again a 
private citizen, wrote him to "remember that 
Achilles made no figure at the spinning-wheel." 
At any rate, as early as February, 1780, he came 
to the front once more as the author of a series 
of essays on the finances. They were published 
in Philadelphia, and attracted the attention of all 
thinking men by their soundness. In fact it was 

94 



Finances : the Treaty of Peace 95 

in our monetary affairs that the key to the situa- 
tion was to be found ; for, had we been wihing to 
pay honestly and promptly the necessary war ex- 
penses, we should have ended the struggle in short 
order. But the niggardliness as well as the real 
poverty of the people, the jealousies of the States, 
kept aflame by the States' -rights leaders for their 
own selfish purposes, and the foolish ideas of most 
of the congressional delegates on all money mat- 
ters, combined to keep our treasury in a pitiable 
condition. 

Morris tried to show the people at large the 
advantage of submitting to reasonable taxation, 
while at the same time combating some of the 
theories entertained as well by themselves as by 
their congressional representatives. He began by 
discussing with great clearness what money really 
is, how far coin can be replaced by paper, the 
interdependence of money and credit, and other 
elementary points in reference to which most of 
his fellow citizens seemed to possess wonderfully 
mixed ideas. He attacked the efforts of Congress 
to make their currency legal tender, and then 
showed the utter futility of one of the pet schemes 
of Revolutionary financial wisdom, the regulation 
of prices by law. Hard times, then as now, 
ahvays produced not only a large debtor class, 
but also a corresponding number of political dema- 
gogues who truckled to it; and both demagogue 



96 Gouverneur Morris 

and debtor, when they clamored for laws which 
should "reheve" the latter, meant thereby laws 
which would enable him to swindle his creditor. 
The people, moreover, liked to lay the blame for 
their misfortunes neither on fate nor on them- 
selves, but on some unfortunate outsider; and 
they were especially apt to attack as "monopo- 
lists" the men who had purchased necessary sup- 
plies in large quantities to profit by their rise in 
price. Accordingly they passed laws against 
them ; and Morris showed in his essays the imwis- 
dom of such legislation, while not defending for a 
moment the men who looked on the misfortunes 
of their coimtry solely as offering a field for their 
own harvesting. 

He ended by drawing out an excellent scheme 
of taxation ; but, unfortunately, the people were 
too short-sighted to submit to any measure of the 
sort, no matter how wise and necessary. One of 
the pleas he made for his scheme was, that some- 
thing of the sort would be absolutely necessary for 
the preservation of the Federal Union, "which," 
he wrote, "in my poor opinion, will greatly depend 
upon the management of the revenue." He 
showed with his usual clearness the need of 
obtaining, for financial as well as for all other 
reasons, a firmer union, as the existing confedera- 
tion bade fair to become, as its enemies had 
prophesied, a rope of sand. He also foretold 



Finances : the Treaty of Peace 97 

graphically the misery that would ensue — and that 
actually did ensue — when the pressure from a for- 
eign foe should cease, and the States should be 
resolved into a disorderly league of petty, squab- 
bling communities. In ending he remarked 
bitterly: "The Articles of Confederation were 
formed when the attachment to Congress was warm 
and great. The framers of them, therefore, seem 
to have been only solicitous how to provide against 
the power of that body, which, by means of their 
foresight and care, now exists by mere courtesy 
and sufferance." 

Although Morris was not able to convert Con- 
gress to the ways of soimd thinking, his ability and 
clearness impressed themselves on all the best men, 
notably on Robert Morris, — who was no relation 
of his, by the way, — the first in the line of Ameri- 
can statesmen who have been great in finance ; a 
man whose services to our treasury stand on a par, 
if not with those of Hamilton, at least with those 
of Gallatin and John Sherman. Congress had 
just established four departments, with secretaries 
at the head of each. The two most important 
were the Departments of Foreign Affairs and of 
Finance. Livingston was given the former, while 
Robert Morris received the latter; and immedi- 
ately afterward appointed Gouvemeur Morris as 
assistant financier, at a salary of eighteen hundred 
and fifty dollars a year. 
7 



98 Gouverneur Morris 

Morris accepted this appointment, and remained 
in office for three years and a half, until the begin- 
ning of 1785. He threw himself heart and soul 
into the work, helping his chief in every way ; and 
in particular giving him invaluable assistance in 
the establishment of the "Bank of North America," 
which Congress was persuaded to incorporate, — an 
institution which was the first of its kind in the 
country. It was of wonderful effect in restoring 
the public credit, and was absolutely invaluable 
in the financial operations imdertaken by the sec- 
retary. 

When, early in 1782, the secretary was directed 
by Congress to present to that body a report on 
the foreign coins circulating in the country, it was 
prepared and sent in by Gouverneur Morris, and 
he accompanied it with a plan for an American 
coinage. The postscript was the really important 
part of the document, and the plan therein set 
forth was made the basis of our present coinage 
system, although not tmtil several years later, and 
then only with important modifications, sug- 
gested, for the most part, by Jefferson. 

Although his plan was modified, it still remains 
true that Gouverneur Morris was the foimder of 
our national coinage. He introduced the system 
Oi decimal notation, invented the word "cent" to 
express one of the smaller coins, and nationalized 
the already familiar word "dollar." His plan, 



Finances : the Treaty of Peace 99 

however, was a little too abstruse for the common 
mind, the unit being made so small that a large 
sum would have had to be expressed in a very 
great number of figures, and there being five or six 
different kinds of new coins, some of them not 
simple multiples of each other. Afterward he 
proposed as a modification a system of pounds, or 
dollars, and doits, the doit answering to our 
present mill, while providing also an ingenious 
arrangement by which the money of accoimt was 
to differ from the money of coinage. Jefferson 
changed the s^^stem by grafting on it the dollar as 
a unit, and simplifying it; and Hamilton per- 
fected it further. 

To imderstand the advantage, as well as the 
boldness, of Morris's scheme, we must keep in 
mind the horrible condition of our currency at 
that time. We had no proper coins of our own ; 
nothing but hopelessly depreciated paper bills, a 
mass of copper, and some clipped and counter- 
feited gold and silver coin from the mints of 
England, France, Spain, and even Germany, 
Dollars, pounds, shillings, doubloons, ducats, 
moidores, joes, crowns, pistareens, coppers, and 
sous circulated indifferently, and with various 
values in each colony. A dollar was worth six 
shillings in Massachusetts, eight in New York, 
seven and sixpence in Pennsylvania, six again in 
Virginia, eight again in North Carolina, thirty- 

LofC. 



iGo Gouverneur Morris 

two and a half in South CaroHna, and five in 
Georgia. The government itself had to resort to 
clipping in one of its most desperate straits ; and 
at last people would only take payment by weight 
of gold or silver. 

Morris, in his report, dwelt especially on three 
points : first, that the new money should be easily 
intelligible to the multitude, and should, therefore, 
bear a close relation to the coins already existing, 
as otherwise its sudden introduction would bring 
business to a standstill, and would excite distrust 
and suspicion everywhere, particularly among the 
poorest and most ignorant, the day-laborers, the 
farm servants, and the hired help; second, that 
its lowest divisible sum, or unit, should be very 
small, so that the price and the value of little 
things could be made proportionate; and third, 
that as far as possible the money should increase 
in decimal ratio. The Spanish dollar was the coin 
most widely circulated, while retaining everywhere 
about the same value. Accordingly he took this, 
and then sought for a unit that would go evenly 
into it, as well as into the various shillings, disre- 
garding the hopelessly aberrant shilling of South 
Carolina. Such a imit was a quarter of a grain of 
pure silver, equal to the one fourteen himdred and 
fortieth part of a dollar; it was not, of course, 
necessary to have it exactly represented in coin. 
On the contrary, he proposed to strike two copper 



Finances : the Treaty of Peace loi 

pieces, respectively of five and eight units, to be 
known as fives and eights. Two eights would then 
make a penny in Pennsylvania, and three eights 
one in Georgia, while three fives would make one 
in New York, and four would make one in Massa- 
chusetts. Morris's great aim was, while estab- 
lishing uniform coins for the entire Union, to get 
rid of the fractional remainders in translating the 
old currencies into the new; and in addition his 
reckoning adapted itself to the different systems 
in the different States, as well as to the different 
coins in use. But he introduced an entirely new 
system of coinage, and moreover used therein the 
names of several old coins while giving them new 
values. His originally proposed table of currency 
was as follows : 

One crown = ten dollars, or 10,000 units. 

One dollar = ten bills, or 1,000 units. 

One bill = ten pence, or 100 units. 

One penny = ten quarters, or .... 10 units. 

One quarter = i unit. 

But he proposed that for convenience other coins 
should be struck, like the copper five and eight 
above spoken of, and he afterward altered his 
names. He then called the bill of one hundred 
imits a cent, making it consist of twenty-five grains 
of silver and two of copper, being thus the lowest 
silver coin. Five cents were to make a quint and 
ten a mark. 



102 Gouverneur Morris 

Congress, according to its custom, received the 
report, applauded it, and did nothing in the matter. 
Shortly afterward, however, Jefferson took it up, 
when the whole subject was referred to a commit- 
tee of which he was a member. He highly ap- 
proved of Morris's plan, and took from it the idea 
of a decimal system, and the use of the words 
"dollar" and "cent." But he considered Morris's 
imit too small, and preferred to take as his own 
the Spanish dollar, which was already known to all 
the people, its value being uniform and well under- 
stood. Then, by keeping strictly to the decimal 
system, and dividing the dollar into one hundred 
parts, he got cents for our fractional currency. He 
thus introduced a simpler system than that of 
Morris, with an existing and well-imderstood imit, 
instead of an imaginary one that would have to be, 
for the first time, brought to the knowledge of the 
people, and which might be adopted only with 
reluctance. On the other hand, Jefferson's system 
failed entirely to provide for the extension of the 
old currencies in the terms of the new without the 
use of fractions. On this account Morris vehem- 
ently opposed it, but it was nevertheless adopted. 
He foretold, what actually came to pass, that the 
people would be very reluctant to throw away 
their local moneys in order to take up a general 
money which bore no special relation to them. 
For half a century afterward the people climg to 



Finances : the Treaty of Peace 103 

their absurd shillings and sixpences, the govern- 
ment itself, in its post-office transactions, being 
obliged to recognize the obsolete terms in vogue in 
certain localities. Some curious pieces circulated 
freely up to the time of the Civil War. Still, 
Jefferson's plan worked admirably in the end. 

All the time he was working so hard at the 
finances, Morris nevertheless continued to enjoy 
himself to the full in the society of Philadel- 
phia. Imperious, light-hearted, good-looking, well- 
dressed, he ranked as a wit among men, as a beau 
among women. He was equally sought for 
dances and dinners. He was a fine scholar and a 
polished gentleman ; a capital story-teller ; and 
had just a touch of erratic levity that served to 
render him still more charming. Occasionally he 
showed whimsical peculiarities, usually about very 
small things, that brought him into trouble ; and 
one such freak cost him a serious injury. In his 
capacity of young man of fashion, he used to drive 
about town in a phaeton with a pair of small, spir- 
ited horses ; and because of some whim, he would 
not allow the groom to stand at their heads. So 
one day they took fright, ran, threw him out, and 
broke his leg. The leg had to be amputated, and 
he was ever afterward forced to wear a wooden 
one. However, he took his loss with most philo- 
sophic cheerfulness, and even bore with equanimity 
the condolences of those exasperating individuals, 



I04 Gouverneur Morris 

of a species by no means peculiar to Revolutionary 
times, who endeavored to prove to him the mani- 
fest falsehood that such an accident was "all for 
the best." To one of these dreary gentlemen he 
responded, with disconcerting vivacity, that his 
visitor had so handsomely argued the advantage 
of being entirely legless as to make him almost 
tempted to part with his remaining limb ; and to 
another he announced that at least there was the 
compensation that he would be a steadier man 
with one leg than with two. Wild accounts of 
the accident got about, which rather irritated him, 
and in answer to a letter from Jay he wrote: "I 
suppose it was Deane who wrote to you from 
France about the loss of my leg. His account is 
facetious. Let it pass. The leg is gone, and there 
is an end of the matter." His being crippled did 
not prevent him from going about in society very 
nearly as much as ever ; and society in Philadel- 
phia was at the moment gayer than in any other 
American city. Indeed Jay, a man of Puritanic 
morality, wrote to Morris somewhat gloomily to 
inquire about "the rapid progress of luxury at 
Philadelphia;" to which his younger friend, who 
highly appreciated the good things of life, replied 
light-heartedly: "With respect to our taste for 
Itixury, do not grieve about it. Luxury is not so 
bad a thing as it is often supposed to be ; and if it 
were, still we must follow the course of things, and 



Finances : the Treaty of Peace 105 

turn to advantage what exists, since we have not 
the power to annihilate or create. The very defi- 
nition of 'luxury ' is as difficult as the suppression 
of it." In another letter he remarked that he 
thought there were quite as many knaves among 
the men who went on foot as there were among 
those who drove in carriages. 

Jay at this time, having been successively a 
member of the Continental Congress, the New 
York Legislature, and the State Constitutional Con- 
vention, having also been the first chief justice of 
his native State, and then president of the Conti- 
nental Congress, had been sent as our minister to 
Spain. Morris always kept up an intimate cor- 
respondence with him. It is noticeable that the 
three great Revolutionary statesmen from New 
York, Hamilton, Jay, and Morris, always kept on 
good terms, and always worked together; while 
the friendship between two, Jay and Morris, was 
very close. 

The two men, in their correspondence, now and 
then touched on other than state matters. One of 
Jay's letters which deals with the education of his 
children would be most healthful reading for those 
Americans of the present day who send their chil- 
dren to be brought up abroad in Swiss schools, or 
English and German universities. He writes: "I 
think the youth of every free, civilized country 
should be educated in it, and not permitted to 



io6 Gouverneur Morris 

travel out of it until age has made them so cool 
and firm as to retain their national and moral 
impressions. American youth may possibly form 
proper and perhaps useful friendships in European 
seminaries, but I think not so probably as among 
their fellow citizens, with whom they are to grow 
up, whom it will be useful for them to know and 
be early known to, and with whom they are to be 
engaged in the business of active life. ... I do 
not hesitate to prefer an American education." 
The longer Jay stayed away, the more devoted he 
became to America. He had a good, hearty, 
honest contempt for the miserable "cosmopoli- 
tanism," so much affected by the feebler folk of 
fashion. As he said, he "could never become so 
far a citizen of the world as to view every part of 
it with equal regard," for "his affections were 
deep-rooted in America," and he always asserted 
that he had never seen anything in Europe to 
cause him to abate his prejudices in favor of his 
own land. 

Jay had a very hard time at the Spanish court, 
which, he wrote Morris, had "little money, less 
wisdom, and no credit." Spain, although fighting 
England, was bitterly jealous of the United States, 
fearing most justly our aggressive spirit, and de- 
siring to keep the lower Mississippi valley entirely 
under its own control. Jay, a statesman of in- 
tensely national spirit, was determined to push our 



Finances : the Treaty of Peace 107 

boundaries as far westward as possible; he in- 
sisted on their reaching to the jMississippi, and on 
our having the right to navigate that stream. 
Morris did not agree with him, and on this sub- 
ject, as has been already said, he for once showed 
less than his usual power of insight into the 
future. He wrote Jay that it was absurd to 
quarrel about a country inhabited only by red 
men, and to claim "a territory we cannot occupy, 
a navigation we cannot enjoy. ' ' He also ventured 
the curiously false prediction that, if the territory 
beyond the Alleghanies should ever be filled up, it 
would be by a population drawn from the whole 
world, not one hundredth part of it American, 
which would immediately become an independent 
and rival nation. However, he could not make 
Jay swerve a hand's breadth from his position 
about our Western boiindaries, though on every 
other point the two were in hearty accord. 

In relating and forecasting the military situa- 
tion, Morris was more happy. He was peculiarly 
interested in Greene, and from the outset foretold 
the final success of his Southern campaign. In a 
letter written March 31, 1781, after the receipt of 
the news of the battle of Guilford Court House, he 
describes to Jay Greene's forces and prospects. 
His troops included, he writes, "from 1500 to 
2000 Continentals, many of them raw, and some- 
what more of militia than regular troops, — the 



io8 Gouverneur Morris 

whole of these almost in a state of nature, and of 
whom it ought to be said, as by Hamlet to Horatio, 
'Thou hast no other revenue but thy good spirits 
to feed and clothe thee.' " The militia he styled 
the " friiges consumere naii of an army." He then 
showed the necessity of the battle being fought, 
on account of the fluctuating state of the militia, 
the incapacity of the state governments to help 
themselves, the poverty of the country ("so that 
the very teeth of the enemy defend them, espe- 
cially in retreat ") , and, above all, because a defeat 
was of little consequence to us, while it would ruin 
the enemy. He wrote: "There is no loss in 
fighting away two or three hundred men who 
would go home if they were not put in the way of 
being knocked on the head. . . . These are unfeel- 
ing reflections. I would apologize for them to any 
one who did not know that I have at least enough 
of sensibility. The gush of sentiment will not 
alter the nature of things, and the business of the 
statesman is more to reason than to feel." Morris 
was always confident that we should win in the 
end, and sometimes thought a little punishment 
really did our people good. When Comwallis was 
in Virginia he wrote: "The enemy are scourging 
the Virginians, at least those of Lower Virginia. 
This is distressing, but will have some good conse- 
quences. In the mean time the delegates of Vir- 
ginia make as many lamentations as ever Jere- 



Finances : the Treaty of Peace 109 

miah did, and to as good purpose perhaps." 
The war was drawing to an end. Great Britain 
had begun the struggle with everything — allies, 
numbers, wealth — in her favor ; but now, toward 
the close, the odds were all the other way. The 
French were struggling with her on equal terms 
for the mastery of the seas; the Spaniards were 
helping the French, and were bending every energy 
to carry through successfully the great siege of 
Gibraltar; the Dutch had joined their ancient 
enemies, and their fleet fought a battle with the 
English, which, for bloody indecisiveness, rivaled 
the actions when Van Tromp and De Ruyter held 
the Channel against Blake and Monk. In India 
the name of Hyder AH had become a very night- 
mare of horror to the British. In America, the 
center of the war, the day had gone conclusively 
against the Island folk. Greene had doggedly 
fought and marched his way through the Southern 
States with his ragged, imder-fed, badly armed 
troops; he had been beaten in three obstinate 
battles, had each time inflicted a greater relative 
loss than he received, and, after retiring in good 
order a short distance, had always ended by pur- 
suing his lately victorious foes ; at the close of the 
campaign he had completely reconquered the 
Southern States by sheer capacity for standing 
pimishment, and had cooped up the remaining 
British force in Charleston. In the Northern 



no 



Gouverneur Morris 



States the British held Newport and New York, 
but could not penetrate elsewhere ; while at York- 
town their ablest general was obliged to surrender 
his whole army to the overwhelming force brought 
against him by Washington's masterly strategy. 

Yet England, hemmed in by the ring of her 
foes, fronted them all with a grand courage. In 
her veins the Berserker blood was up, and she 
hailed each new enemy with grim delight, exerting 
to the full her warlike strength. Single-handed 
she kept them all at bay, and repaid with crippling 
blows the injuries they had done her. In America 
alone the tide ran too strongly to be turned. But 
Holland was stripped of all her colonies; in the 
East, Sir Eyre Coote beat down Hyder AH, and 
taught Moslem and Hindoo alike that they could 
not shake off the grasp of the iron hands that held 
India. Rodney won back for his country the 
supremacy of the ocean in that great sea-fight 
where he shattered the splendid French navy ; and 
the long siege of Gibraltar closed with the crushing 
overthrow of the assailants. So, with bloody 
honor, England ended the most disastrous war she 
had ever waged. 

The war had brought forth many hard fighters, 
but only one great commander, — Washington. 
For the rest, on land, Comwallis, Greene, Rawdon, 
and possibly Lafayette and Rochambeau, might 
all rank as fairly good generals, probably in the 



Finances: the Treaty of Peace m 

order named, although many excellent critics place 
Greene first. At sea, Rodney and the Bailli de 
Suffren won the honors ; the latter stands beside 
Duquesne and Tourville in the roll of French 
admirals; while Rodney was a true latter-day 
buccaneer, as fond of fighting as of pltmdering, and 
a first-rate hand at both. Neither ranks with such 
mighty sea-chiefs as Nelson, nor yet with Blake, 
Farragut, or Tegethof . 

All parties were tired of the war; peace was 
essential to all. But of all, America was most 
resolute to win what she had fought for; and 
America had been the most successful so far. 
English historians — even so generally impartial a 
writer as Mr. Lecky — are apt greatly to exag- 
gerate our relative exhaustion, and try to prove it 
by quoting from the American leaders every state- 
ment that shows despondency and suffering. If 
they applied the same rule to their own side, they 
would come to the conclusion that the British 
empire was at that time on the brink of dissolution. 
Of course we had suffered very heavily, and had 
blimdered badly; but in both respects we were 
better off than our antagonists. Mr. Lecky is 
right in bestowing imstinted praise on our diplo- 
matists for the hardihood and success with which 
they insisted on all our demands being granted; 
but he is wrong when he says or implies that the 
military situation did not warrant their attitude. 



112 Gouverneur Morris 

Of all the contestants, America was the most 
willing to continue the fight rather than yield her 
rights. Morris expressed the general feeling when 
he wrote to Jay, on August 6, 1782: "Nobody 
will be thankful for any peace but a very good 
one. This they should have thought on who made 
war with the republic. I am among the nimiber 
who would be extremely ungrateful for the grant 
of a bad peace. My public and private character 
will both concert to render the sentiment coming 
from me imsuspected. Judge, then, of others, 
judge of the many-headed fool who can feel no 
more than his own sorrowing. ... I wish that 
while the war lasts it may be real war, and that 
when peace comes it may be real peace." As to 
our military efficiency, we may take Washington's 
word (in a letter to Jay of October 18, 1782) : 
"I am certain it will afford you pleasure to know 
that our army is better organized, disciplined, and 
clothed than it has been at any period since the 
commencement of the war. This you may be 
assured is the fact." 

Another mistake of English historians — again 
likewise committed by Mr. Lecky — comes in their 
laying so much stress on the help rendered to the 
Americans by their allies, while at the same time 
speaking as if England had none. As a matter of 
fact, England would have stood no chance at all 
had the contest been strictly confined to British 



Finances: the Treaty of Peace 113 

troops on the one hand, and to the rebelHous colo- 
nists on the other. There were more German 
aiixiharies in the British ranks than there were 
French alHes in the American; the loyaHsts, in- 
cluding the regularly enlisted loyalists as well as 
the militia who took part in the various Tory 
uprisings, were probably more numerous still. 
The withdrawal of all Hessians, Tories, and In- 
dians from the British army would have been 
cheaply purchased by the loss of our own foreign 
allies. 

The European powers were even a shade more 
anxious for peace than we were ; and to conduct 
the negotiations for our side, we chose three of our 
greatest statesmen, — Franklin, Adams, and Jay. 

Congress, in appointing our commissioners, had, 
with little regard for the national dignity, given 
them instructions which, if obeyed, would have 
rendered them completely subservient to France; 
for they were directed to undertake nothing in the 
negotiations without the knowledge and concur- 
rence of the French cabinet, and in all decisions to 
be ultimately governed by the advice of that body. 
Morris fiercely resented such servile subservience, 
and in a letter to Jay denotmced Congress with 
well-justified warmth, writing: "That the proud 
should prostitute the very little dignity this poor 
coimtry is possessed of would be indeed astound- 
ing, if we did not know the near alliance between 
8 



114 Gouverneur Morris 

pride and meanness. Men who have too little 
spirit to demand of their constituents that they 
do their duty, who have sufficient humility to beg 
a paltry pittance at the hands of any and every 
sovereign, — such men will always be ready to pay 
the price which vanity shall demand from the 
vain." Jay promptly persuaded his colleagues to 
imite with him in disregarding the instructions of 
Congress on this point; had he not done so, the 
dignity of our government would, as he wrote 
Morris, "have been in the dust." Franklin was 
at first desirous of yielding obedience to the com- 
mand, but Adams immediately joined Jay in 
repudiating it. 

We had waged war against Britain, with France 
and Spain as allies ; but in making peace we had 
to strive for our rights against our friends almost 
as much as against our enemies. There was much 
generous and disinterested enthusiasm for America 
among Frenchmen individually; but the French 
government, with which alone we were to deal in 
making peace, had acted throughout from purely 
selfish motives, and in reality did not care an atom 
for American rights. We owed France no more 
gratitude for taking our part than she owed us for 
giving her an opportimity of advancing her own 
interests, and striking a severe blow at an old-time 
enemy and rival. As for Spain, she disliked us 
quite as much as she did England. 



Finances: the Treaty of Peace 115 

The peace negotiations brought all this out very 
clearly. The great French minister, Vergennes, 
who dictated the policy of his court all through the 
contest, cared nothing for the Revolutionary colo- 
nists themselves ; but he was bent upon securing 
them their independence, so as to weaken England, 
and he was also bent upon keeping them from 
gaining too much strength, so that they might 
always remain dependent allies of France. He 
wished to establish the "balance of power" system 
in America. The American commissioners he at 
first despised for their blimt, truthful straightfor- 
wardness, w^hich he, trained in the school of deceit, 
and a thorough believer in every kind of finesse 
and double-dealing, mistook for boorishness ; later 
on, he learned to his chagrin that they were able 
as well as honest, and that their resolution, skill, 
and far-sightedness made them, where their own 
deepest interests were concerned, over-matches for 
the subtle diplomats of Europe. 

America, then, was determined to secure not 
only independence, but also a chance to grow into 
a great continental nation ; she wished her bound- 
aries fixed at the Great Lakes and the Mississippi ; 
she also asked for the free navigation of the latter 
to the Gulf, and for a share in the fisheries. Spain 
did not even wish that we should be made inde- 
pendent; she hoped to be compensated at our 
expense for her failure to take Gibraltar ; and she 



ii6 Gouverneur Morris 

desired that we should be kept so weak as to 
hinder us from being aggressive. Her fear of us, 
by the way, was perfectly justifiable, for the 
greatest part of our present territory lies within 
what were nominally Spanish limits a hundred 
years ago, France, as the head of a great coali- 
tion, wanted to keep on good terms with both her 
allies; but, as Gerard, the French minister at 
Washington, said, if France had to choose between 
the two, "the decision would not be in favor of 
the United States." She wished to secure for 
America independence, but she wished also to 
keep the new nation so weak that it would ' ' feel 
the need of sureties, allies, and protectors." 
France desired to exclude our people from the 
fisheries, to deprive us of half our territories by 
making the AUeghanies our Western boundaries, 
and to secure to Spain the tmdisputed control of 
the navigation of the Mississippi. It was not to 
the interest of France and Spain that we should 
be a great and formidable people, and very natu- 
rally they would not help us to become one. There 
is no need of blaming them for their conduct, but 
it would have been rank folly to have been guided 
by their wishes. Our true policy was admirably 
summed up by Jay in his letters to Livingston, 
where he says: " Let us be honest and grateful to 
France, but let us think for ourselves. . . Since 
we have asstimed a place in the political firmament 



Finances : the Treaty of Peace 1 17 

let us move like a primary and not a secondary- 
planet." Fortimately, England's own self-interest 
made her play into our hands ; as Fox put it, it 
was necessary for her to "insist in the strongest 
manner that, if America is independent, she must 
be so of the whole world. No secret, tacit, or 
ostensible connection with France." 

Our statesmen won ; we got all we asked, as 
much to the astonishment of France as of Eng- 
land; we proved even more successful in diplo- 
macy than in arms. As Fox had hoped, we be- 
came independent not only of England, but of all 
the world ; we were not entangled as a dependent 
subordinate in the policy of France, nor did we 
sacrifice our Western boundary to Spain. It was 
a great triumph, — greater than any that had been 
won by our soldiers. Franklin had a compara- 
tively small share in gaining it; the glory of 
carrying through successfully the most important 
treaty we ever negotiated belongs to Jay and 
Adams, and especially to Jay. 



CHAPTER VI. 

THE FORMATION OF THE NATIONAL CONSTITUTION. 

BEFORE peace was established, Morris had 
been appointed a commissioner to treat for 
the exchange of prisoners. Nothing came 
of his efforts, however, the British and Americans 
being utterly unable to come to any agreement. 
Both sides had been greatly exasperated, — the 
British by the Americans' breach of faith about 
Burgoyne's troops, and the Americans by the 
inhuman brutality with which their captive coun- 
trymen had been treated. An amusing feature of 
the affair was a conversation between Morris and 
the British general, Dalrymple, wherein the former 
assured the latter rather patronizingly that the 
British "still remained a great people, a very 
great people," and that "they would undoubtedly 
still hold their rank in Europe." He would have 
been surprised had he known not only that the 
stubborn Island folk were destined soon to hold a 
higher rank in Europe than ever before, but that 
from their loins other nations, broad as continents, 
were to spring, so that the South Seas should 
become an English ocean, and that over a fourth 
of the world's surface there should be spoken the 
tongue of Pitt and Washington. 

ii8 



Formation of the Constitution 119 

No sooner was peace declared, and the immedi- 
ate and pressing danger removed, than the confed- 
eration relapsed into a loose knot of communities, 
as quarrelsome as they were contemptible. The 
states' -rights men for the moment had things all 
their own way, and speedily reduced us to the level 
afterward reached by the South American repub- 
lics. Each commonwealth set up for itself, and 
tried to oppress its neighbors ; not one had a cred- 
itable history for the next four years; while the 
career of Rhode Island in particular can only be 
properly described as infamous. We refused to 
pay our debts, we would not even pay our army ; 
and mob violence flourished rankly. As a natural 
result, the European powers began to take advan- 
tage of our weakness and division. 

All our great men saw the absolute need of 
establishing a National Union — not a league or a 
confederation — if the coimtry was to be saved. 
None felt this more strongly than Morris, and no 
one was more hopeful of the final result. Jay had 
written to him as to the need of "raising and 
maintaining a national spirit in America ; " and he 
wrote in reply, at different times: "Much of con- 
vulsion will yet ensue, yet it must terminate in 
giving to government that power without which 
government is but a name. . . . This coimtry has 
never yet been known to Europe, and God knows 
whether it ever will be. To England it is less 



I20 



Gouverneur Morris 



known than to any other part of Europe, because 
they constantly view it through a medium of either 
prejudice or faction. True it is that the general 
government wants energy, and equally true it is 
that the want will eventually be supplied. A 
national spirit is the natural result of national 
existence ; and although some of the present genera- 
tion may feel the result of colonial oppositions of 
opinion, that generation will die away and give 
place to a race of Americans.^ On this occasion, 
as on others. Great Britain is our best friend ; and, 
by seizing the critical moment when we were about 
to divide, she has shown us the dreadful conse- 
quences of division. . . Indeed, my friend, noth- 
ing can do us so much good as to convince the 
Eastern and Southern States how necessary it is 
to give proper force to the federal government, 
and nothing will so soon operate that conviction 
as foreign efforts to restrain the navigation of the 
one and the commerce of the other." The last 
sentence referred to the laws aimed at our trade 
by Great Britain, and by other powers as well, — 
symptoms of outside hostility which made us at 
once begin to draw together again. 

Money troubles grew apace, and produced the 
usual crop of crude theories and of vicious and dis- 
honest legislation in accordance therewith. Law- 
less outbreaks became common, and in Massachu- 

» The italics are mine. 



Formation of the Constitution 121 

setts culminated in actual rebellion. The mass of 
the people were rendered hostile to any closer 
union by their ignorance, their jealousy, and the 
general particularistic bent of their minds, — this 
last being merely a vicious graft on, or rather out- 
growth of, the love of freedom inborn in the race. 
Their leaders were enthusiasts of pure purpose 
and imsteady mental vision ; they were followed 
by the mass of designing politicians, who feared 
that their importance would be lost if their sphere 
of action should be enlarged. Among these leaders 
the three most important were, in New York, 
George Clinton, and, in Massachusetts and Vir- 
ginia, two much greater men, — Samuel Adams and 
Patrick Henry. All three had done excellent ser- 
vice at the beginning of the Revolutionary troubles. 
Patrick Henry lived to redeem himself, almost in 
his last hour, by the noble stand he took in aid of 
Washington against the democratic nullification 
agitation of Jefferson and Madison ; but the use- 
fulness of each of the other two was limited to the 
early portion of his career. 

Like every other true patriot and statesman, 
Morris did all in his power to bring into one com- 
bination the varied interests favorable to the for- 
mation of a government that should be strong and 
responsible as well as free.. The public creditors 
and the soldiers of the army — whose favorite 
toasts were, "A hoop to the barrel," and "Cement 



122 Gouverneur Morris 

to the Union " — were the two classes most sensible 
of the advantages of such a government; and to 
each of these Morris addressed himself when he 
proposed to consolidate the public debt, both to 
private citizens and to the soldiers, and to make it 
a charge on the United States, and not on the 
several separate States. In consequence of the 
activity and ability with which he advocated a 
firmer union, the extreme states' -rights men were 
especially hostile to him; and certain of their 
ntimber assailed him with bitter malignity, both 
then and afterward. 

One accusation was, that he had improper con- 
nections with the public creditors. This was a pure 
slander, absolutely without foundation, and not 
supported by even the pretense of proof. Another 
accusation was that he favored the establishment 
of a monarchy. This was likewise entirely untrue. 
Morris was not a sentimental political theorist; 
he was an eminently practical — that is, useful — 
statesman, who saw with unusual clearness that 
each people must have a government suited to its 
own individual character, and to the stage of 
political and social development it had reached. 
He realized that a nation must be governed accord- 
ing to the actual needs and capacities of its citi- 
zens, not according to any abstract theory or set 
of ideal principles. He would have dismissed with 
contemptuous laughter the ideas of those Ameri- 



Formation of the Constitution 123 

cans who at the present day beUeve that Anglo- 
Saxon democracy can be appHed successfully to a 
half -savage negroid people in Hayti, or of those 
Englishmen who consider seriously the proposition 
to renovate Turkey by giving her representative 
institutions and a parliamentary government. He 
imderstood and stated that a monarchy "did not 
consist with the taste and temper of the people" 
in America, and he believed in establishing a form 
of government that did. Like almost every other 
statesman of the day, the perverse obstinacy of the 
extreme particularist section at times made him 
downhearted, and caused him almost to despair of 
a good government being established; and like 
every sensible man he would have preferred almost 
any strong, orderly government to the futile an- 
archy toward which the ultra states' -rights men 
or separatists tended. Had these last ever finally 
obtained the upper hand, either in Revolutionary 
or post-Revolutionary times, either in 1787 or 
1 86 1, the fact would have shown conclusively that 
Americans were imfitted for republicanism and 
self-government. An orderly monarchy woiild 
certainly be preferable to a republic of the epilep- 
tic Spanish-American type. The extreme doc- 
trinaires, who are fiercest in declaiming in favor 
of freedom, are in reality its worst foes, far 
more dangerous than any absolute monarchy 
ever can be. When liberty becomes license, 



124 Gouverneur Morris 

some form of one-man power is not far distant. 
The one great reason for our having succeeded 
as no other people ever has, is to be found in that 
common sense which has enabled us to preserve 
the largest possible individual freedom on the 
one hand, while showing an equally remarkable 
capacity for combination on the other. We have 
committed plenty of faults, but we have seen and 
remedied them. Our very doctrinaires have usu- 
ally acted much more practically than they have 
talked. Jefferson, when in power, adopted most 
of the FederaHst theories, and became markedly 
hostile to the nullification movements at whose 
birth he had himself officiated. We have often 
blundered badly in the beginning, but we have 
always come out well in the end. The Dutch, 
when they warred for freedom from Spanish rule, 
showed as much short-sighted selfishness and 
bickering jealousy as even our own Revolutionary 
ancestors, and only a part remained faithful to 
the end: as a result, but one section won inde- 
pendence, while the Netherlands were divided, and 
never grasped the power that should have been 
theirs. As for the Spanish- Americans, they split 
up hopelessly almost before they were free, and, 
though they bettered their condition a little, yet 
lost nine-tenths of what they had gained. Scot- 
land and Ireland, when independent, were nests 
of savages. All the follies our forefathers com- 



Formation of the Constitution 125 

mitted can be paralleled elsewhere, but their suc- 
cesses are unique. 

So it was in the few years immediately succeed- 
ing the peace by which we won our independence. 
The mass of the people wished for no closer union 
than was to be found in a lax confederation ; but 
they had the good sense to learn the lesson taught 
by the weakness and lawlessness they saw around 
them; they reluctantly made up their minds to 
the need of a stronger government, and when they 
had once come to their decision, neither dema- 
gogue nor doctrinaire could swerve them from it. 

The national convention to form a constitution 
met in May, 1787 ; and rarely in the world's his- 
tory has there been a deliberative body which 
contained so many remarkable men, or produced 
results so lasting and far-reaching. The Congress 
whose members signed the Declaration of Inde- 
pendence had but cleared the ground on which 
the framers of the Constitution were to build. 
Among the delegates in attendance, easily first 
stood Washington and Franklin, — two of that 
great American trio in which Lincoln is the third. 
Next came Hamilton from New York, having as 
colleagues a couple of mere obstructionists sent 
by the Clintonians to handicap him. From Penn- 
sylvania came Robert Morris and Gouvemeur 
Morris ; from Virginia, Madison ; from South Car- 
olina, Rutledge and the Pinckneys; and so on 



126 Gouverneur Morris 

through the other States. Some of the most noted 
statesmen were absent, however. Adams and Jef- 
ferson were abroad. Jay was acting as secretary 
for foreign affairs, in which capacity, by the way, 
he had shown most imlooked-f or weakness in yield- 
ing to Spanish demands about the Mississippi. 

Two years after taking part in the proceedings 
of the American Constitutional Convention, Morris 
witnessed the opening of the States General of 
Prance. He thoroughly appreciated the absolute 
and curious contrast offered by these two bodies, 
each so big with fate for all mankind. The men 
who predominated in and shaped the actions of 
the first belonged to a type not imcommonly 
brought forth by a people already accustomed to 
freedom at a crisis in the struggle to preserve or 
extend its liberties. During the past few centuries 
this type had appeared many times among the 
liberty-loving nations who dwelt on the shores of 
the Baltic and the North Sea ; and our forefathers 
represented it in its highest and most perfect 
shapes. It is a type only to be found among men 
already trained to govern themselves as well as 
others. The American statesmen were the kins- 
folk and fellows of Hampden and Pym, of William 
the Silent and John of Bameveldt. Save love of 
freedom, they had little in common with the 
closet philosophers, the enthusiastic visionaries, 
and the selfish demagogues who in France helped 



Formation of the Constitution 127 

pull up the flood-gates of an all-swallowing torrent. 
They were great men ; but it was less the greatness 
of mere genius than that springing from the union 
of strong, virile qualities with steadfast devotion 
to a high ideal. In certain respects they were 
ahead of all their European compeers; yet they 
preserved virtues forgotten or sneered at by the 
contemporaneous generation of trans-Atlantic 
leaders. They wrought for the future as surely 
as did the French Jacobins ; but their spirit was 
the spirit of the Long Parliament. They were 
resolute to free themselves from the tyranny of 
man; but they had not unlearned the reverence 
felt by their fathers for their fathers' God. They 
were sincerely religious. The advanced friends of 
freedom abroad scoffed at religion, and would have 
laughed outright at a proposition to gain help for 
their cause by prayer ; but to the founders of our 
Constitution, when matters were at a deadlock, 
and the outcome looked almost hopeless, it seemed 
a most fit and proper thing that one of the chief of 
their number should propose to invoke to aid 
them a wisdom greater than the wisdom of human 
beings. Even those among their descendants who 
no longer share their trusting faith may yet well 
do regretful homage to a religious spirit so deep- 
rooted and so strongly tending to bring out a pure 
and high morality. The statesmen who met in 
1787 were earnestly patriotic. They unselfishly 



128 Gouverneur Morris 

desired the welfare of their countrymen. They 
were cool, resolute men, of strong convictions, 
with clear insight into the future. They were 
thoroughly acquainted with the needs of the com- 
munity for which they were to act. Above all, 
they possessed that inestimable quality, so 
characteristic of their race, hard-headed common 
sense. Their theory of government was a very 
high one; but they imderstood perfectly that it 
had to be accommodated to the shortcomings of 
the average citizen. Small indeed was their re- 
semblance to the fiery orators and brilliant pam- 
phleteers of the States General. They were 
emphatically good men; they were no less em- 
phatically practical men. They would have 
scorned Mirabeau as a scoundrel ; they would have 
despised Sieyes as a vain and impractical theorist. 
The deliberations of the convention in their 
result illustrated in a striking manner the truth 
of the American principle, that — for deliberative, 
not executive, purposes — the wisdom of many men 
is worth more than the wisdom of any one man. 
The Constitution that the members assembled in 
convention finally produced was not only the best 
possible one for America at that time, but it was 
also, in spite of its shortcomings, and taking into 
account its fitness for our own people and condi- 
tions, as well as its accordance with the principles 
of abstract right, probably the best that any 



Formation of the Constitution 129 

nation has ever had, while it was beyond question 
a very much better one than any single member 
could have prepared. The particularist statesmen 
would have practically denied us any real union or 
efficient executive power ; while there was hardly 
a Federalist member who would not, in his anxiety 
to avoid the evils from which we were suffering, 
have given us a government so centralized and 
aristocratic that it would have been utterly im- 
suited to a proud, liberty-loving, and essentially 
democratic race, and would have infallibly pro- 
voked a tremendous reactionary revolt. 

It is impossible to read through the debates of 
the convention without being struck by the innu- 
merable shortcomings of each individual plan pro- 
posed by the several members, as divulged in their 
speeches, when compared with the plan finally 
adopted. Had the result been in accordance with 
the views of the strong-government men like Ham- 
ilton on the one hand, or of the weak-government 
men like Franklin on the other, it would have been 
equally disastrous for the coimtry. The men who 
afterward naturally became the chiefs of the Fed- 
eralist party, and who included in their number 
the bulk of the great Revolutionary leaders, were 
the ones to whom we mainly owe our present form 
of government ; certainly we owe them more, both 
on this and on other points, than we do their rivals, 
the after-time Democrats. Yet there were some 

9 



I30 Gouverneur Morris 

articles of faith in the creed of the latter so essen- 
tial to our national well-being, and yet so coiinter 
to the prejudices of the Federalists, that it was 
inevitable they should triumph in the end. Jeffer- 
son led the Democrats to victory only when he had 
learned to acquiesce thoroughly in some of the 
fundamental principles of Federalism, and the 
government of himself and his successors was good 
chiefly in so far as it followed out the theories of 
the Hamiltonians ; while Hamilton and the Feder- 
alists fell from power because they could not learn 
the one great truth taught by Jefferson, — that in 
America a statesman should trust the people, and 
should endeavor to secure to each man all pos- 
sible individual liberty, confident that he will use 
it aright. The old-school Jeffersonian theorists 
believed in "a strong people and a weak govern- 
ment." Lincoln was the first who showed how a 
strong people might have a strong government and 
yet remain the freest on the earth. He seized — 
half unwittingly — all that was best and wisest in 
the traditions of Federalism ; he was the true suc- 
cessor of the Federalist leaders ; but he grafted on 
their system a profound belief that the great heart 
of the nation beat for truth, honor, and liberty. 

This fact, that in 1787 all the thinkers of the 
day drev/ out plans that in some respects went 
very wide of the mark, must be kept in mind, or 
else we shall judge each particular thinker with 



Formation of the Constitution 131 

undue harshness when we examine his utterances 
without comparing them with those of his fellows. 
But one partial exception can be made. In the 
Constitutional Convention Madison, a moderate 
Federalist, was the man who, of all who were 
there, saw things most clearly as they were, and 
whose theories most closely corresponded with the 
principles fmally adopted ; and although even he 
was at first dissatisfied with the result, and both by 
word and by action interpreted the Constitution 
in widely different ways at different times, still 
this was Madison's time of glory: he was one of 
the statesmen who do extremely useful work, but 
only at some single given crisis. While the Con- 
stitution was being formed and adopted, he stood 
in the very front ; but in his later career he simk 
his own individuality, and became a mere pale 
shadow of Jefferson. 

Morris played a very prominent part in the 
convention. He was a ready speaker, and among 
all the able men present there was probably no 
such really brilliant thinker. In the debates he 
spoke more often than any one else, although 
Madison was not far behind him ; and his speeches 
betrayed, but with marked and exaggerated em- 
phasis, both the virtues and the shortcomings of 
the Federalist school of thought. They show us, 
too, why he never rose to the first rank of states- 
men. His keen, masterful mind, his far-sightedness 



132 Gouverneur Morris 

and the force and subtlety of his reasoning 
were all marred by his incurable cynicism and 
deep-rooted distrust of mankind. He throughout 
appears as advocatus diaholi; he puts the lowest 
interpretation upon every act, and frankly avows 
his disbelief in all generous and unselfish motives. 
His continual allusions to the overpowering influ- 
ence of the baser passions, and to their mastery of 
the human race at all times, drew from Madison, 
although the two men generally acted together, a 
protest against his "forever inculcating the utter 
political depravity of men, and the necessity for 
opposing one vice and interest as the only possible 
check to another vice and interest." 

Morris championed a strong national govern- 
ment, wherein he was right; but he also cham- 
pioned a system of class representation, leaning 
toward aristocracy, wherein he was wrong. Not 
Hamilton himself was a firmer believer in the 
national idea. His one great object was to secure 
a powerful and lasting Union, instead of a loose 
federal league. It must be remembered that in 
the convention the term "federal" was used in 
exactly the opposite sense to the one in which it 
was taken afterward ; that is, it was used as the 
antithesis of "national," not as its synonym. The 
States' -rights men used it to express a system of 
government such as that of the old federation of 
the thirteen colonies ; while their opponents called 



Formation of the Constitution 133 

themselves Nationalists, and only took the title of 
Federalists after the Constitution had been formed, 
and then simply because the name was popular 
with the masses. They thus appropriated their 
adversaries' party name, bestowing it on the or- 
ganization most hostile to their adversaries' party 
theories. Similarly, the term "Republican Party," 
which was originally in our history merely another 
name for the Democracy, has in the end been 
adopted by the chief opponents of the latter. 

The difficulties for the convention to surmount 
seemed insuperable ; on almost every question that 
came up, there were clashing interests. Strong 
government and weak government, pure democ- 
racy or a modified aristocracy, small States and 
large States, North and South, slavery and free- 
dom, agricultural sections as against commercial 
sections, — on each of twenty points the delegates 
split into hostile camps, that could only be recon- 
ciled by concessions from both sides. The Consti- 
tution was not one compromise ; it was a bundle 
of compromises, all needful. 

Morris, like every other member of the conven- 
tion, sometimes took the right and sometimes the 
wrong side on the successive issues that arose. 
But on the most important one of all he made no 
error ; and he commands our entire sympathy for 
his thoroughgoing nationalism. As was to be 
expected, he had no regard whatever for states' 



134 Gouverneur Morris 

rights. He wished to deny to the small States the 
equal representation in the Senate finally allowed 
them ; and he was undoubtedly right theoretically. 
No good argument can be adduced in support of 
the present system on that point. Still, it has 
thus far worked no harm; the reason being that 
our States have merely artificial boundaries, while 
those of small population have hitherto been dis- 
tributed pretty evenly among the different sec- 
tions, so that they have been split up like the 
others on every important issue, and thus have 
never been arrayed against the rest of the country. 

Though Morris and his side were defeated in 
their efforts to have the States represented propor- 
tionally in the Senate, yet they carried their point 
as to representation in the House. Also, on the 
general question of making a national government, 
as distinguished from a league or federation, the 
really vital point, their triumph was complete. 
The Constitution they drew up and had adopted 
no more admitted of legal or peaceable rebellion — 
whether called secession or nullification — on the 
part of the State than on the part of a coimty or 
an individual. 

Morris expressed his own views with his usual 
clear-cut, terse vigor when he asserted that "state 
attachments and state importance had been the 
bane of the country," and that he came, not as 
a mere delegate from one section, but "as a repre- 



Formation of the Constitution 135 

sentative of America, — a representative in some 
degree of the whole human race, for the whole 
human race would be affected by the outcome of 
the convention." And he poured out the flood 
of his biting scorn on those gentlemen who came 
there "to truck and bargain for their respective 
States," asking what man there was who could tell 
with certainty the State wherein he — and even 
more wherein his children — would live in the 
future ; and reminding the small States, with cav- 
alier indifference, that, "if they did not Hke the 
Union, no matter, — they would have to come in, 
and that was all there was about it; for if per- 
suasion did not unite the country, then the sword 
would." His correct language and distinct envm.- 
ciation — to which Madison has borne witness — 
allowed his grim truths to carry their full weight ; 
and he brought them home to his hearers with a 
rough, almost startling earnestness and directness. 
Many of those present must have winced when he 
told them that it would matter nothing to America 
"if all the charters and constitutions of the States 
were thrown into the fire, and all the demagogues 
into the ocean," and asserted that "any particular 
State ought to be injured, for the sake of a ma- 
jority of the people, in case its conduct showed 
that it deserved it. " He held that we should create 
a national government, to be the one and only 
supreme power in the land, — one which, unlike a 



136 Gouverneur Morris 

mere federal league, such as we then lived under, 
should have complete and compulsive operation; 
and he instanced the examples as well of Greece 
as of Germany and the United Netherlands, to 
prove that local jurisdiction destroyed every tie of 
nationality. 

It shows the boldness of the experiment in which 
we were engaged, that we were forced to take all 
other nations, whether dead or living, as warnings, 
not examples; whereas, since we succeeded, we 
have served as a pattern to be copied, either wholly 
or in part, by every other people that has followed 
in our steps. Before our own experience, each 
similar attempt, save perhaps on the smallest 
scale, had been a failure. Where so many other 
nations teach by their mistakes, we are among the 
few who teach by their successes. 

Be it noted also that, the doctrinaires to the 
contrary notwithstanding, we proved that a strong 
central government was perfectly compatible with 
absolute democracy. Indeed, the separatist spirit 
does not lead to true democratic freedom. An- 
archy is the handmaiden of tyranny. Of all the 
States, South Carolina has shown herself (at least 
throughout the greater part of the present century) 
to be the most aristocratic, and the most wedded 
to the separatist spirit. The German masses were 
never so groimd down by oppression as when the 
little German principalities were most independent 



Formation of the Constitution 137 

of each other and of any central authority. 
Morris beheved in letting the United States in- 
terfere to put down a rebellion in a State, even 
though the executive of the State himself should 
be at the head of it; and he was supported in 
his views by Pinckney, the ablest member of the 
brilliant and useful but unfortunately short-lived 
school of South Carolina Federalists. Pinckney 
was a thoroughgoing Nationalist ; he wished to go 
a good deal farther than the convention actually 
went in giving the central government complete 
control. Thus he proposed that Congress should 
have power to negative by a two-thirds vote all 
state laws inconsistent with the harmony of the 
Union. Madison also wished to give Congress a 
veto over state legislation. Morris believed that 
a national law should be allowed to repeal any 
state law, and that Congress should legislate in all 
cases where the laws of the States conflicted among 
themselves. 

Yet Morris, on the very question of nationalism, 
himself showed the narrowest, blindest, and least 
excusable sectional jealousy on one point. He felt 
as an American for all the Union, as it then ex- 
isted; but he feared and dreaded the growth of 
the Union in the West, the very place where it 
was inevitable, as well as in the highest degree 
desirable, that the greatest growth should take 
place. He actually desired the convention to 



138 Gouverneur Morris 

commit the criminal folly of attempting to provide 
that the West should always be kept subordinate 
to the East. Fortunately he failed ; but the mere 
attempt casts the gravest discredit alike on his far- 
sightedness and on his reputation as a statesman. 
It is impossible to understand how one who was 
usually so cool and clear-headed an observer could 
have blundered so flagrantly on a point hardly less 
vital than the establishment of the Union itself. 
Indeed, had his views been carried through, they 
would in the end have nullified all the good be- 
stowed by the Union. In speaking against state 
jealousy, he had shown its foolishness by observing 
that no man could tell in what State his children 
would dwell ; and the folly of the speaker himself 
was made quite as clear by his not perceiving that 
their most likely dwelling-place was in the West. 
This jealousy of the West was even more discredit- 
able to the Northeast than the jealousy of America 
had been to England; and it continued strong, 
especially in New England, for very many years. 
It was a mean and unworthy feeling ; and it was 
greatly to the credit of the Southerners that they 
shared it only to a very small extent. The South, 
in fact, originally was in heartiest sympathy with 
the West ; it was not until the middle of the pres- 
ent century that the coimtry beyond the AUe- 
ghanies became preponderatingly Northern in sen- 
timent. In the Constitutional Convention itself, 



Formation of the Constitution 139 

Butler of South Carolina pointed out "that the 
people and strength of America were evidently 
tending westwardly and south westwardly . " 

Morris wished to discriminate against the West 
by securing to the Atlantic States the perpetual 
control of the Union. He brought this idea up 
again and again, insisting that we should reserve 
to ourselves the right to put conditions on the 
V/estem States when we should admit them. He 
dwelt at length on the danger of throwing the pre- 
ponderance of influence into the Western scale; 
stating his dread of the "back members," who 
were always the most ignorant, and the opponents 
of all good measures. He foretold with fear that 
some day the people of the West vs^ould outnumber 
the people of the East, and he wished to put it in 
the power of the latter to keep a majority of the 
votes in their own hands. Apparently he did not 
see that, if the West once became as populous as 
he predicted, its legislators would forthwith cease 
to be " back members." The futility of his fears, 
and still more of his remedies, was so evident that 
the convention paid very little heed to either. 

On one point, however, his anticipations of harm 
were reasonable, and indeed afterward came true 
in part. He insisted that the West, or interior, 
would join the South and force us into a war with 
some European power, wherein the benefits would 
accrue to them and the harm to the Northeast. 



I40 Gouverneur Morris 

The attitude of the South and West already clearly 
foreshadowed a struggle with Spain for the Mis- 
sissippi valley; and such a struggle would surely 
have come, either with the French or Spaniards, 
had we failed to secure the territory in question by 
peaceful purchase. As it was, the realization of 
Morris's prophecy was only put off for a few years ; 
the South and West brought on the War of 1812, 
wherein the East was the chief sufferer. 

On the question as to whether the Constitution 
should be made absolutely democratic or not, 
Morris took the conservative side. On the suffrage 
his views are perfectly defensible : he believed that 
it should be limited to freeholders. He rightly 
considered the question as to how widely it should 
be extended to be one of expediency merely. It 
is simply idle folly to talk of suffrage as being an 
"inborn" or "natural" right. There are enor- 
mous commimities totally unfit for its exercise; 
while true imiversal suffrage never has been, and 
never will be, seriously advocated by any one. 
There must always be an age limit, and such a 
limit must necessarily be purely arbitrary. The 
wildest democrat of Revolutionary times did not 
dream of doing away with the restrictions of race 
and sex which kept most American citizens from 
the ballot-box; and there is certainly much less 
abstract right in a system which limits the suffrage 
to people of a certain color than there is in one 



Formation of the Constitution 141 

which Hmits it to people who come up to a given 
standard of thrift and intelhgence. On the other 
hand, our experience has not proved that men of 
wealth make any better use of their ballots than 
do, for instance, mechanics and other handicrafts- 
men. No plan could be adopted so perfect as to 
be free from all drawbacks. On the whole, how- 
ever, and taking our country in its length and 
breadth, manhood suffrage has worked well, better 
than would have been the case with any other 
system ; but even here there are certain localities 
where its results have been evil, and must simply 
be accepted as the blemishes inevitably attendant 
upon, and marring, any effort to carry out a 
scheme that will be widely applicable. 

Morris contended that his plan would work no 
novel or great hardship, as the people in several 
States were already accustomed to freehold suf- 
frage. He considered the freeholders to be the 
best guardians of liberty, and maintained that the 
restriction of the right to them was only creating 
a necessary safeguard "against the dangerous in- 
fluence of those people, without property or prin- 
ciple, with whom, in the end, our country, like all 
other countries, was sure to abound." He did not 
believe that the ignorant and dependent could be 
trusted to vote. Madison supported him heartily, 
likewise thinking the freeholders the safest guard- 
ians of our rights; he indulged in some gloomy 



142 Gouverneur Morris 

(and fortunately hitherto unverified) forebodings 
as to our future, which sound strangely coming 
from one who was afterward an especial pet of 
the Jeff ersonian democracy. He said: "In future 
times a great majority of the people will be with- 
out landed or any other property. They will then 
either combine under the influence of their common 
situation, — in which case the rights of property 
and the public liberty will not be safe in their 
hands, — or, as is more probable, they will become 
the tools of opulence and ambition." 

Morris also enlarged on this last idea. "Give 
the votes to people who have no property, and 
they will sell them to the rich," said he. When 
taunted with his aristocratic tendencies, he an- 
swered that he had long ceased to be the dupe of 
words, that the mere soimd of the name "aris- 
tocracy" had no terrors for him, but that he did 
fear lest harm should result to the people from the 
unacknowledged existence of the very thing they 
feared to mention. As he put it, there never was 
or would be a civilized society without an aris- 
tocracy, and his endeavor was to keep it as much 
as possible from doing mischief. He thus pro- 
fessed to be opposed to the existence of an aris- 
tocracy, but convinced that it would exist anyhow, 
and that therefore the best thing to be done was to 
give it a recognized place, while clipping its wings 
so as to prevent its working harm. In pursuance 



i ! 



i 



Formation of the Constitution 143 

of this theory, he elaborated a wild plan, the chief 
feature of which was the provision for an aristo- 
cratic senate, and a popular or democratic house, 
which were to hold each other in check, and 
thereby prevent either party from doing damage. 
He believed that the senators should be appointed 
by the national executive, who should fill up the 
vacancies that occurred. To make the upper 
house effective as a checking branch, it should be 
so constituted as to have a personal interest in 
checking the other branch ; it should be a senate 
for life, it should be rich, it should be aristocratic. 
He continued: It would then do wrong? He 
believed so ; he hoped so. The rich would strive 
to enslave the rest ; they always did. The proper 
security against them was to form them into a 
separate interest. The two forces would then con- 
trol each other. By thus combining and setting 
apart the aristocratic interest, the popular interest 
would also be combined against it. There would 
be mutual check and mutual security. If, on the 
contrary, the rich and poor were allowed to mingle, 
then, if the coimtry were commercial, an oligarchy 
would be established; and if it were not, an im- 
limited democracy would ensue. It was best to 
look truth in the face. The loaves and fishes 
would be needed to bribe demagogues ; while as 
for the people, if left to themselves, they would 
never act from reason alone. The rich would take 



144 Gouverneur Morris 

advantage of their passions, and the result would 
be either a violent aristocracy, or a more violent 
despotism. — The speech containing these extraor- 
dinary sentiments, which do no particular credit 
to either Morris's head or heart, is given in sub- 
stance by Madison in the "Debates." Madison's 
report is undoubtedly correct, for, after writing it, 
he showed it to the speaker himself, who made but 
one or two verbal alterations. 

Morris applied an old theory in a new way when 
he proposed to make "taxation proportional to 
representation" throughout the Union. He con- 
sidered the preservation of property as being the 
distinguishing object of civilization, as liberty was 
sufficiently guaranteed even by savagery; and 
therefore he held that the representation in the 
Senate should be according to property as well as 
numbers. But when this proposition was defeated, 
he declined to support one making property quali- 
fications for congressmen, remarking that such 
were proper for the electors rather than the 
elected. 

His views as to the power and fimctions of the 
national executive were in the main sound, and he 
succeeded in having most of them embodied in the 
Constitution. He wished to have the President 
hold office during good behavior ; and, though this 
was negatived, he succeeded in having him made 
reeligible to the position. He was instnmiental in 



Formation of the Constitution 145 

giving him a qualified veto over legislation, and 
in providing for his impeachment for misconduct ; 
and also in having him made commander-in-chief 
of the forces of the republic, and in allowing him 
the appointment of governmental officers. The 
especial service he rendered, however, was his 
successful opposition to the plan whereby the 
President was to be elected by the legislature. 
This proposition he combated with all his strength, 
showing that it would take away greatly from the 
dignity of the executive, and would render his 
election a matter of cabal and faction, "like the 
election of the pope by a conclave of cardinals." 
He contended that the President should be chosen 
by the people at large, by the citizens of the United 
States, acting through electors whom they had 
picked out. He showed the probability that in 
such a case the people would unite upon a man of 
continental reputation, as the influence of design- 
ing demagogues and tricksters is generally power- 
ful in proportion as the limits within which they 
work are narrow ; and the importance of the stake 
would make all men inform themselves thoroughly 
as to the characters and capacities of those who 
were contending for it; and he flatly denied the 
statements, that were made in evident good faith, 
to the effect that in a general election each State 
would cast its vote for its own favorite citizen. 
He inclined to regard the President in the light of 
10 



146 Gouverneur Morris 

a tribune chosen by the people to watch over the 
legislature ; and giving him the appointing power, 
he believed, would force him to make good use of 
it, owing to his sense of responsibility to the people 
at large, who would be directly affected by its 
exercise, and who could and would hold him 
accoimtable for its abuse. 

On the judiciary his views were also sound. He 
upheld the power of the judges, and maintained 
that they should have absolute decision as to the 
constitutionality of any law. By this means he 
hoped to provide against the encroachments of the 
popular branch of the government, the one from 
which danger was to be feared, as "virtuous citi- 
zens will often act as legislators in a way of which 
they would, as private individuals, afterward be 
ashamed." He wisely disapproved of low salaries 
for the judges, showing that the amounts must be 
fixed from time to time in accordance with the 
manner and style of living in the country ; and that 
good work on the bench, where it was especially 
needful, like good work everywhere else, could only 
be insured by a high rate of recompense. On the 
other hand, he approved of introducing into the 
national Constitution the foolish New York state 
inventions of a Council of Revision and an Execu- 
tive Council. 

His ideas of the duties and powers of Congress 
were likewise very proper on the whole. Most 



Formation of the Constitution 147 

citizens of the present day will agree with him that 
"the excess rather than the deficiency of laws is 
what we have to dread." He opposed the hurtful 
provision which requires that each congressman 
should be a resident of his own district, urging that 
congressmen represented the people at large, as 
well as their own small localities; and he also 
objected to making officers of the army and navy 
ineligible. He laid much stress on the propriety 
of passing navigation acts to encourage American 
bottoms and seamen, as a navy was essential to 
our security, and the shipping business was always 
one that stood in peculiar need of public patronage. 
Also, like Hamilton and most other Federalists, he 
favored a policy of encouraging domestic manu- 
factures. Incidentally he approved of Congress 
having power to lay an embargo, although he has 
elsewhere recorded his views as to the general 
futility of such kinds of "commercial warfare." 
He believed in having a uniform bankruptcy law ; 
approved of abolishing all religious tests as quali- 
fications for office, and was utterly opposed to the 
"rotation in office" theory. 

One curious incident in the convention was the 
sudden outcropping, even thus early, of a "Native 
American " movement against all foreigners, which 
was headed by Butler of South Carolina, who him- 
self was of Irish parentage. He strenuously in- 
sisted that no foreigners whomsoever should be 



148 Gouverneur Morris 

admitted to our councils, — a rather odd proposi- 
tion, considering that it would have excluded quite 
a number of the eminent men he was then address- 
ing. Pennsylvania in particular — whose array of 
native talent has always been far from imposing — 
had a number of foreigners among her delegates, 
and loudly opposed the proposition, as did New 
York. These States wished that there should be 
no discrimination whatever between native and 
foreign-bom citizens; but finally a compromise 
was agreed to, by which the latter were excluded 
only from the presidency, but were admitted to all 
other rights after a seven years' residence, — a 
period that was certainly none too long. 

A much more serious struggle took place over 
the matter of slavery, quite as important then as 
ever, for at that time the negroes were a fifth of 
our population, instead of, as now, an eighth. The 
question, as it came before the convention, had 
several sides to it; the especial difficulty arising 
over the representation of the slave States in 
Congress, and the importation of additional slaves 
from Africa. No one proposed to abolish slavery 
offhand ; but an influential though small number 
of delegates, headed by Morris, recognized it as a 
terrible evil, and were very loath either to allow 
the South additional representation for the slaves, 
or to permit the foreign trade in them to go on. 
When the Southern members banded together on 



Formation of the Constitution 149 

the issue, and made it evident that it was the one 
which they regarded as almost the most important 
of all, Morris attacked them in a telling speech, 
stating with his usual boldness facts that most 
Northerners only dared hint at, and summing up 
with the remark that, if he was driven to the 
dilemma of doing injustice to the Southern States 
or to human nature, he would have to do it to 
the former ; certainly he would not encourage the 
slave trade by allowing representation for negroes. 
Afterward he characterized the proportional 
representation of the blacks even more strongly, 
as being "a bribe for the importation of 
slaves." 

In advocating the proposal, first made by Ham- 
ilton, that the representation should in all cases be 
proportioned to the number of free inhabitants, 
Morris showed the utter lack of logic in the Vir- 
ginian proposition, which was that the slave States 
should have additional representation to the extent 
of three-fifths of their negroes. If negroes were to 
be considered as inhabitants, then they ought to be 
added in their entire number ; if they were to be 
considered as property, then they ought to be 
coimted only if all other wealth was likewise 
included. The position of the Southerners was 
ridiculous : he tore their arguments to shreds ; but 
he was powerless to alter the fact that they were 
doggedly determined to carry their point, while 



I50 Gouverneur Morris 

most of the Northern members cared compara- 
tively Httle about it. 

In another speech he painted in the blackest 
colors the unspeakable misery and wrong wrought 
by slavery, and showed the blight it brought upon 
the land. "It was the curse of Heaven on the 
States where it prevailed." He contrasted the 
prosperity and happiness of the Northern States 
with the misery and poverty which overspread the 
barren wastes of those where slaves were numerous. 
"Every step you take through the great region of 
slavery presents a desert widening with the in- 
creasing number of these wretched beings." He 
indignantly protested against the Northern States 
being boimd to march their militia for the defense 
of the Southern States against the very slaves of 
whose existence the Northern men complained. 
"He would sooner submit himself to a tax for 
paying for all the negroes in the United States 
than saddle posterity with such a Constitution." 

Some of the high-minded Virginian statesmen 
were quite as vigorous as he was in their demmcia- 
tion of the system. One of them, George Mason, 
portrayed the effect of slavery upon the people 
at large with bitter emphasis, and denounced 
the slave traffic as "infernal," and slavery as a 
national sin that would be punished by a national 
calamity, — stating therein the exact and terrible 
truth. In shameful contrast, many of the North- 



Formation of the Constitution 151 

emers championed the institution ; in particular, 
OHver Ellsworth of Connecticut, whose name 
should be branded with infamy because of the 
words he then uttered. He actually advocated 
the free importation of negroes into the South 
Atlantic States, because the slaves "died so fast 
in the sickly rice swamps" that it was necessary 
ever to bring fresh ones to labor and perish in the 
places of their predecessors; and, with a brutal 
cynicism, peculiarly revolting from its mercantile 
baseness, he brushed aside the question of morality 
as irrelevant, asking his hearers to pay heed only 
to the fact that "what enriches the part enriches 
the whole." 

The Virginians were opposed to the slave trade; 
but South Carolina and Georgia made it a condi- 
tion of their coming into the Union. It was ac- 
cordingly agreed that it should be allowed for a 
limited time, — twelve years; and this was after- 
ward extended to twenty by a bargain made by 
Maryland and the three south Atlantic States 
with the New England States, the latter getting in 
return the help of the former to alter certain pro- 
visions respecting commerce. One of the main 
industries of the New England of that day was 
the manufacture of rum; and its citizens cared 
more for their distilleries than for all the slaves 
held in bondage throughout Christendom. The 
rum was made from molasses which they imported 



152 Gouverneur Morris 

from the West Indies, and they carried there in 
return the fish taken by their great fishing fleets ; 
they also carried the slaves into the Southern 
ports. Their commerce was what they especially 
relied on; and to gain support for it they were 
perfectly willing to make terms with even such a 
black Mam,mon of tmrighteousness as the Southern 
slaveholding system. Throughout the contest, 
Morris and a few other stout anti-slavery men 
are the only ones who appear to advantage; the 
Virginians, who were honorably anxious to mini- 
mize the evils of slavery, come next; then the 
other Southerners who allowed pressing self- 
interest to overcome their scruples; and, last of 
all, the New Englanders whom a comparatively 
trivial self-interest made the willing allies of the 
extreme slaveholders. These last were the only 
Northerners who yielded anything to the Southern 
slaveholders that was not absolutely necessary; 
and yet they were the forefathers of the most de- 
termined and effective foes that slavery ever had. 
As already said, the Southerners stood firm on 
the slave question : it was the one which perhaps 
more than any other offered the most serious ob- 
stacle to a settlement. Madison pointed out "that 
the real difference lay, not between the small States 
and the large, but between the Northern and the 
Southern States. The institution of slavery and 
its consequences formed the real line of discnmina- 



Formation of the Constitution 153 

tion." To talk of this kind Morris at first an- 
swered hotly enough : "He saw that the Southern 
gentlemen would not be satisfied unless they saw 
the way open to their gaining a majority in the 
public councils. ... If [the distinction they set 
up between the North and South] was real, instead 
of attempting to blend incompatible things, let 
them at once take a friendly leave of each other." 
He afterward went back from this position, and 
agreed to the compromise by which the slaves 
were to add, by three-fifths of their number, to the 
representation of their masters, and the slave trade 
was to be allowed for a certain number of years, 
and prohibited forever after. He showed his usual 
straightforward willingness to call things by their 
right names in desiring to see "slavery" named 
outright in the Constitution, instead of being char- 
acterized with cowardly circumlocution, as was 
actually done. 

In finally yielding and assenting to a compro- 
mise, he was perfectly right. The crazy talk about 
the iniquity of consenting to any recognition of 
slavery whatever in the Constitution is quite beside 
the mark ; and it is equally irrelevant to assert that 
the so-called "compromises" were not properly 
compromises at all, because there were no mutual 
concessions, and the Southern States had "no 
shadow of right " to what they demanded and only 
in part gave up. It was all-important that there 



154 Gouverneur Morris 

should be a Union, but it had to result from the 
voluntary action of all the States ; and each State 
had a perfect "right" to demand just whatever it 
chose. The really wise and high-minded statesmen 
demanded for themselves nothing save justice ; but 
they had to accomplish their purpose by yielding 
somewhat to the prejudices of their more foolish 
and less disinterested colleagues. It was better to 
limit the duration of the slave trade to twenty 
years than to allow it to be continued indefinitely, 
as would have been the case had the South Atlantic 
States remained by themselves. The three-fifths 
representation of the slaves was an evil anomaly, 
but it was no worse than allowing the small States 
equal representation in the Senate; indeed, bal- 
ancing the two concessions against each other, it 
must be admitted that Virginia and North Caro- 
lina surrendered to New Hampshire and Rhode 
Island more than they got in return. 

No man who supported slavery can ever have a 
clear and flawless title to our regard; and those 
who opposed it merit, in so far, the highest honor ; 
but the opposition to it sometimes took forms that 
can be considered only as the vagaries of limacy. 
The only hope of abolishing it lay, first in the 
establishment and then in the preservation of the 
Union ; and if we had at the outset dissolved into 
a knot of struggling anarchies, it would have en- 
tailed an amoiint of evil both on our race and on, 



Formation of the Constitution 155 

all North America, compared to which the endur- 
ance of slavery for a century or two would have 
been as nothing. If we had even split up into 
only two republics, a Northern and a Southern, 
the West would probably have gone with the 
latter, and to this day slavery would have existed 
throughout the Mississippi Valley ; much of what 
is now our territory would have been held by Euro- 
pean powers, scornfully heedless of our divided 
might, while in not a few States the form of gov- 
ernment would have been a military dictatorship ; 
and indeed our whole history would have been as 
contemptible as was that of Germany for some 
centuries prior to the rise of the house of Hohen- 
zollem. 

The fierceness of the opposition to the adoption 
of the Constitution, and the narrowness of the 
majority by which Virginia and New York de- 
cided in its favor, while North Carolina and Rhode 
Island did not come in at all until absolutely 
forced, showed that the refusal to compromise on 
any one of the points at issue would have jeopard- 
ized everything. Had the slavery interest been 
in the least dissatisfied, or had the plan of govern- 
ment been a shade less democratic, or had the 
smaller States not been propitiated, the Constitu- 
tion would have been rejected offhand; and the 
coimtry would have had before it decades, perhaps 
centuries, of misrule, violence, and disorder. 



156 Gouverneur Morris 

Madison paid a ver}' just compliment to some 
of Morris's best points when he wrote, anent his 
services in the convention: "To the brilliancy of 
his genius he added, what is too rare, a candid sur- 
render of his opinions when the Hght of discussion 
satisfied him that they had been too hastily formed, 
and a readiness to aid in making the best of meas- 
ures in which he had been overruled." Although 
so many of his own theories had been rejected, he 
was one of the warmest advocates of the Constitu- 
tion ; and it was he who finally drew up the docu- 
ment and put the finish to its style and arrange- 
ment, so that, as it now stands, it comes from his 
pen. 

Hamilton, who more than any other man bore 
the brunt of the fight for its adoption, asked 
Morris to help him in writing the "FederaHst," 
but the latter was for some reason imable to do so ; 
and Hamilton was assisted only by Madison, and 
to a ver>' sHght extent by Jay. Pennsylvania, the 
State from which !Morris had been sent as a dele- 
gate, early declared in favor of the new experi- 
ment ; although, as ^lorris wrote Washington, 
there had been cause to "dread the cold and sour 
temper of the back coimties, and still more the 
wicked industry* of those who have long habituated 
themselves to Hve on the pubUc, and cannot bear 
the idea of being removed from the power and 
profit of state government, which has been and 



( 



Alexander Hamilton 



I 



Formation of the Constitution 157 

still is the means of supporting themselves, their 
families, and dependents, and (which perhaps is 
equally grateful) of depressing and humbling their 
political adversaries." In his own native State of 
New York the influences he thus describes were 
still more powerful, and it needed all Hamilton's 
wonderful genius to force a ratification of the 
Constitution in spite of the stupid selfishness of 
the Clintonian faction; as it was, he was only 
barely successful, although backed by all the best 
and ablest leaders in the commimity, — Jay, Liv- 
ingston, Schuyler, Stephen Van Rensselaer, Isaac 
Roosevelt, James Duane, and a host of others. 

About this time Morris came back to New York 
to live, having purchased the family estate at Mor- 
risania from his elder brother, Staats Long Morris, 
the British general. He had for some time been 
engaged in various successful commercial ventures 
with his friend Robert Morris, including an East 
India voyage on a large scale, shipments of tobacco 
to France, and a share in iron works on the Dela- 
ware River, and had become quite a rich man. 
As soon as the war was ended, he had done what 
he could do to have the loyalists pardoned and 
reinstated in their fortimes; thereby risking his 
popularity not a little, as the general feeling 
against the Tories was bitter and malevolent in 
the highest degree, in curious contrast to the 
good-will that so rapidly sprang up between the 



158 Gouverneur Morris 

Unionists and ex-Confederates after the Civil 
War. 

He also kept an eye on foreign politics, and one 
of his letters to Jay curiously foreshadows the 
good-will generally felt by Americans of the 
present day toward Russia, running: "If her 
ladyship (the Czarina) would drive the Turk out 
of Europe, and demolish the Algerines and other 
piratical gentry, she will have done us much good 
for her own sake; . . . but it is hardly possible 
the other powers will permit Russia to possess so 
wide a door into the Mediterranean. I may be 
deceived, but I think England herself would 
oppose it. As an American, it is my hearty wish 
that she may effect her schemes." 

Shortly after this it became necessary for him 
to sail for Europe on business. 



CHAPTER VII. 

FIRST STAY IN FRANCE. 

AFTER a hard winter passage of forty days' 
length Morris reached France, and arrived 
in Paris on February 3,1789. He remained 
there a year on his private business ; but his promi- 
nence in America, and his intimate friendship with 
many distinguished Frenchmen, at once admitted 
him to the highest social and political circles, 
where his brilliant talents secured him immediate 
importance. 

The next nine years of his life were spent in 
Europe, and it was during this time that he un- 
knowingly rendered his especial and peculiar ser- 
vice to the public. As an American statesman he 
has many rivals, and not a few superiors ; but as a 
penetrating observer and recorder of contempo- 
rary events, he stands alone among the men of his 
time. He kept a full diary during his stay abroad, 
and was a most voluminous correspondent; and 
his capacity for keen, shrewd observation, his 
truthfulness, his wonderful insight into character, 
his sense of humor, and his power of graphic 
description, all combine to make his comments on 
the chief men and events of the day a unique 
record of the inside history of Western Eiu^ope 

159 



i6o Gouverneur Morris 

during the tremendous convulsions of the French 
Revolution, He is always an entertaining and in 
all matters of fact a trustworthy writer. His 
letters and diary together form a real mine of 
wealth for the student either of the social life of 
the upper classes in France just before the out- 
break, or of the events of the revolution itself. 

In the first place, it must be premised that from 
the outset Morris was hostile to the spirit of the 
French Revolution, and his hostility grew in pro- 
portion to its excesses until at last it completely 
swallowed up his original antipathy to England, 
and made him regard France as normally our 
enemy, not our ally. This was perfectly natural, 
and indeed inevitable : in all really free coimtries, 
the best friends of freedom regarded the revolu- 
tionists, when they had fairly begun their bloody 
career, with horror and anger. It was only to 
oppressed, debased, and priest-ridden peoples that 
the French Revolution could come as the embodi- 
ment of liberty. Compared to the freedom already 
enjoyed by Americans, it was sheer tyranny of the 
most dreadful kind. 

Morris saw clearly that the popular party in 
France, composed in part of amiable visionaries, 
theoretic philanthropists, and closet constitution- 
mongers, and in part of a brutal, sodden populace, 
maddened by the grinding wrongs of ages, knew 
not whither its own steps tended ; and he also saw 



First Stay in France i6i 

that the then existing generation of Frenchmen 
were not, and never would be, fitted to use Hberty 
aright. It is small matter for wonder that he could 
not see as clearly the good which lay behind the 
movement ; that he could not as readily foretell the 
real and great improvement it was finally to bring 
about, though only after a generation of hideous 
convulsions. Even as it was, he discerned what 
was happening, and what was about to happen, 
more distinctly than did any one else. The wild 
friends of the French Revolution, especially in 
America, supported it blindly, with but a very 
slight notion of w^hat it really signified. Keen 
though Morris's intellectual vision was, it was im- 
possible for him to see what future lay beyond the 
quarter of a century of impending tumult. It did 
not lie within his powers to applaud the fiendish 
atrocities of the Red Terror for the sake of the 
problematical good that would come to the next 
generation. To do so he would have needed the 
granite heart of a zealot, as well as the prophetic 
vision of a seer. 

The French Revolution was in its essence a 
struggle for the abolition of privilege, and for 
equality in civil rights. This Morris perceived, 
almost alone among the statesmen of his day; 
and he also perceived that most Frenchmen were 
willing to submit to any kind of government that 
would secure them the things for which they 
II 



i62 Gouverneur Morris 

strove. As he wrote to Jefferson, when the repub- 
lic was well under weigh: "The great mass of the 
French nation is less solicitous to preserve the 
present order of things than to prevent the return 
of the ancient oppression, and of course would 
more readily submit to a pure despotism than to 
that kind of monarchy whose only limits were 
found in those noble, legal, and clerical corps by 
which the people were alternately oppressed and 
insulted." To the downtrodden masses of conti- 
nental Europe, the gift of civil rights and the 
removal of the tyranny of the privileged classes, 
even though accompanied by the rule of a direc- 
tory, a consul, or an emperor, represented an 
immense political advance ; but to the free people 
of England, and to the freer people of America, 
the change would have been wholly for the worse. 
Such being the case, Morris's attitude was nat- 
ural and proper. There is no reason to question 
the sincerity of his statement in another letter, 
that "I do, from the bottom of my heart, wish well 
to this country [France]." Had the French people 
shown the least moderation or wisdom, he would 
have unhesitatingly sided with them against their 
oppressors. It must be kept in mind that he was 
not influenced in the least in his course by the 
views of the upper classes with whom he mingled. 
On the contrary, when he first came to Europe, he 
distinctly lost popularity in some of the social 



First Stay in France 163 

circles in which he moved, because he was so much 
more conservative than his aristocratic friends, 
among whom the closest republicanism of the phil- 
osophers was for the moment all the rage. He 
had no love for the French nobility, whose folly 
and ferocity caused the revolution, and whose 
craven cowardice could not check it even before it 
had gathered headway. Long afterward he wrote 
of some of the emigres: "The conversation of 
these gentlemen, who have the virtue and good 
fortune of their grandfathers to recommend them, 
leads me almost to forget the crimes of the French 
Revolution ; and often the unforgiving temper and 
sanguinary wishes which they exhibit make me 
almost believe that the assertion of their enemies 
is true, namely, that it is success alone which has 
determined on whose side should be the crimes, 
and on whose the miseries." The truth of the last 
sentence was strikingly verified by the White 
Terror, even meaner, if less bloody, than the Red. 
Bourbon princes and Bourbon nobles were alike, 
and Morris only erred in not seeing that their 
destruction was the condition precedent upon all 
progress. 

There was never another great struggle, in the 
end productive of good to mankind, where the 
tools and methods by which that end was won 
were so wholly vile as in the French Revolution. 
Alone among movements of the kind, it brought 



i64 Gouverncur Morris 

forth no leaders entitled to our respect ; none who 
were both great and good; none even who were 
very great, save, at its beginning, strange, strong, 
crooked Mirabeau, and at its close the towering 
world-genius who sprang to power by its means, 
wielded it for his own selfish purposes, and dazzled 
all nations over the wide earth by the glory of his 
strength and splendor. 

We can hardly blame Morris for not appreci- 
ating a revolution whose immediate outcome was 
to be Napoleon's despotism, even though he failed 
to see all the good that would remotely spring 
therefrom. He considered, as he once wrote a 
friend, that "the true object of a great statesman 
is to give to any particular nation the kind of laws 
which is suitable to them, and the best constitution 
which they are capable of." There can be no 
sounder rule of statesmanship ; and none was more 
flagrantly broken by the amiable but incompetent 
political doctrinaires of 1789. Thus the American, 
as a far-sighted statesman, despised the theorists 
who began the revolution, and, as a humane 
and honorable man, abhorred the blackhearted 
wretches who carried it on. His view of the 
people among whom he foiind himself, as well as 
his statement of his own position, he himself has 
recorded : "To fit people for a republic, as for any 
other form of government, a previous education is 
necessary. ... In despotic governments the 



First Stay in France 165 

people, habituated to beholding everything bend- 
ing beneath the weight of power, never possess 
that power for a moment without abusing it. 
Slaves, driven to despair, take arms, execute vast 
vengeance, and then sink back to their former 
condition of slaves. In such societies the patriot, 
the melancholy patriot, sides with the despot, 
because anything is better than a wild and bloody 
confusion." 

So much for an outline of his views. His writ- 
ings preserve them for us in detail on almost every 
important question that came up during his stay 
in Europe ; couched, moreover, in telling, piquant 
sentences that leave room for hardly a dull line in 
either letters or diary. 

No sooner had he arrived in Paris than he 
sought out Jefferson, then the American minister, 
and Lafayette. They engaged him to dine on the 
two following nights. He presented his various 
letters of introduction, and in a very few weeks, 
by his wit, tact, and ability, had made himself 
completely at home in what was by far the most 
brilliant and attractive — although also the most 
hopelessly imsound — fashionable society of any 
European capital. He got on equally well with 
fine ladies, philosophers, and statesmen; was as 
much at his ease in the salons of the one as at the 
dinner-tables of the other; and all the time ob- 
served and noted down, with the same humorous 



i66 Gouverneur Morris 

zest, the social peculiarities of his new friends as 
well as the tremendous march of political events. 
Indeed, it is difficult to laiow whether to set the 
higher value on his penetrating observations con- 
cerning public affairs, or on his witty, light, half- 
satirical sketches of the men and women of the 
world with whom he was thrown in contact, told 
in his usual charming and effective style. No 
other American of note has left us writings half so 
humorous and amusing, filled, too, with informa- 
tion of the greatest value. 

Although his relations with Jefferson were at 
this time very friendly, yet his ideas on most sub- 
jects were completely at variance with those of the 
latter. He visited him very often ; and, after one 
of these occasions, jots down his opinion of his 
friend in his usual amusing vein: "Call on Mr. 
Jefferson, and sit a good while. General conver- 
sation on character and politics. I think he does 
not form very just estimates of character, but 
rather assigns too many to the humble rank of 
fools; whereas in life the gradations are infinite, 
and each individual has his peculiarities of fort 
and feeble:" not a bad protest against the dan- 
gers of sweeping generalization. Another time he 
records his judgment of Jefferson's ideas on public 
matters as follows: "He and I differ in our sys- 
tems of politics. He, with all the leaders of lib- 
erty here, is desirous of annihilating distinctions 



First Stay in France 167 

of order. How far such views may be right re- 
specting mankind in general is, I think, extremely 
problematical. But with respect to this nation I 
am sure they are wrong, and cannot eventuate 
wen." 

As soon as he began to go out in Parisian 
society, he was struck by the closet republicanism 
which it had become the fashion to affect. After 
his first visit to Lafayette, who received him with 
that warmth and frank, open-handed hospitality 
which he always extended to Americans, IMorris 
writes: "Lafayette is full of politics; he appears 
to be too republican for the genius of his country." 
And again, when Lafayette showed him the draft 
of the celebrated Declaration of Rights, he notes: 
"I gave him my opinions, and suggested several 
amendments tending to soften the high-colored ex- 
pressions of freedom. It is not by sounding words 
that revolutions are produced." Elsewhere he 
writes that "the yoimg nobility have brought 
themselves to an active faith in the natural equal- 
ity of mankind, and spurn at everything which 
looks like restraint." Some of their number, how- 
ever, he considered to be actuated by considera- 
tions more tangible than mere sentiment. He 
chronicles a dinner with some members of the 
National Assembly, where "one, a noble repre- 
senting the Tiers, is so vociferous against his own 
order, that I am convinced he means to rise by his 



i68 Gouverneur Morris 

eloquence, and finally will, I expect, vote with the 
opinion of the court, let that be what it may." 
The sentimental humanitarians — who always form 
a most pernicious body, with an influence for bad 
hardly surpassed by that of the professionally 
criminal class — of course throve vigorously in an 
atmosphere where theories of mawkish benevolence 
went hand in hand with the habitual practice of 
vices too gross to name. Morris, in one of his 
letters, narrates an instance in point ; at the same 
time showing how this excess of watery philan- 
thropy was, like all the other movements of the 
French Revolution, but a violent and misguided 
reaction against former abuses of the opposite sort. 
The incident took place in Madame de Stael's 
salon. "The Count de Clermont Tonnerre, one 
of their best orators, read to us a very pathetic 
oration ; and the object was to show that no pen- 
alties are the legal compensations for crimes or 
injuries : the man who is hanged, having by that 
event paid his debt to society, ought not to be 
held in dishonor; and in like manner he who has 
been condemned for seven years to be flogged in 
the galley should, when he has served out his 
apprenticeship, be received again into good com- 
pany, as if nothing had happened. You smile; 
but observe the extreme to which the matter was 
carried the other way. Dishonoring thousands for 
the guilt of one has so shocked the public senti- 



First Stay in France 169 

ment as to render this extreme fashionable. The 
oration was very fine, very sentimental, very 
pathetic, and the style harmonious. Shouts of 
applause and full approbation. When this was 
pretty well over, I told him that his speech was 
extremely eloquent, but that his principles were 
not very solid. Universal surprise ! " 

At times he became rather weary of the constant 
discussion of politics, which had become the chief 
drawing-room topic. Among the capacities of his 
lively and erratic nature was the power of being 
intensely bored by anything dull or monotonous. 
He remarked testily that "republicanism was 
absolutely a moral influenza, from which neither 
titles, places, nor even the diadem can guard the 
possessor." In a letter to a friend on a different 
subject he writes: "Apropos, — a term which my 
Lord Chesterfield well observes w^e generally use 
to bring in what is not at all to the purpose, — 
apropos, then, I have here the strangest employ- 
ment imaginable. A republican, and just as it 
were emerged from that assembly which has 
formed one of the most republican of all repub- 
lican constitutions, I preach incessantly respect for 
the prince, attention to the rights of the nobles, 
and above all moderation, not only in the object, 
but also in the pursuit of it. All this you will say 
is none of my business ; but I consider France as 
the natural ally of my country, and, of course 



I70 Gouverneur Morris 

that we are interested in her prosperity; besides, 
to say the truth, I love France." 

His hostiUty to the fashionable cult offended 
some of his best friends. The Lafayettes openly 
disapproved his sentiments. The marquis told him 
that he was injuring the cause, because his senti- 
ments were being continually quoted against "the 
good party." Morris answered that he was opposed 
to democracy from a regard to liberty; that the 
popular party were going straight to destruction, 
and he would fain stop them if he could ; for their 
views respecting the nation were totally inconsist- 
ent with the materials of which it was composed, 
and the worst thing that could happen to them 
would be to have their wishes granted. Lafayette 
half admitted that this was true: "He tells me 
that he is sensible his party are mad, and tells 
them so, but is not the less determined to die with 
them. I tell him that I think it would be quite 
as well to bring them to their senses and live with 
them," — the last sentence showing the impatience 
with which the shrewd, fearless, practical Ameri- 
can at times regarded the dreamy inefficiency of 
his French associates. Madame de Lafayette was 
even more hostile than her husband to Morris's 
ideas. In commenting on her beliefs he says: 
"She is a very sensible woman, but has formed her 
ideas of government in a manner not suited, I 
think, either to the situation, the circiimstances, 



First Stay in France 171 

or the disposition of France." He was consid- 
ered too much of an aristocrat in the salon 
of the Comtesse de Tesse, the resort of "repub- 
Hcans of the first feather;" and at first was some- 
times rather coldly received there. He felt, 
however, a most sincere friendship and regard for 
the comtesse, and thoroughly respected the ear- 
nestness with which she had for twenty years done 
what lay in her power to give her coimtry greater 
liberty. She was a genuine enthusiast, and, when 
the National Assembly met, was filled with exult- 
ant hope for the future. The ferocious outbreaks 
of the mob, and the crazy lust for blood shown by 
the people at large, startled her out of her faith, 
and shocked her into the sad belief that her life- 
long and painful labors had been wasted in the aid 
of a bad cause. Later in the year Morris writes: 
"I find Madame de Tesse is become a convert to 
my principles. We have a gay conversation of 
some minutes on their affairs, in which I mingle 
sound maxims of government with that piquant 
legerete which this nation delights in. She insists 
that I dine with her at Versailles the next time I 
am there. We are vastly gracious, and all at once, 
in a serious tone, "Mais attendez, madame, est-ce 
que je suis trop aristocrat?' To which she an- 
swers, with a smile of gentle humility, 'Oh, mon 
Dieu, non!'" 

It is curious to notice how rapidly Morris's 



172 Gouverneur Morris 

brilliant talents gave him a commanding position, 
stranger and guest though he was, among the most 
noted statesmen of France ; how often he was con- 
sulted, and how widely his opinions were quoted. 
Moreover, his incisive truthfulness makes his writ- 
ings more valuable to the historian of his time 
than are those of any of his contemporaries, 
French, English, or American. Taine, in his great 
work on the revolution, ranks him high among the 
small number of observers who have recorded clear 
and sound judgments of those years of confused, 
formless tumult and horror. 

All his views on French politics are very strik- 
ing. As soon as he reached Paris, he was impressed 
by the imrest and desire for change prevailing 
everywhere, and wrote home: "I find on this side 
of the Atlantic a resemblance to what I left on the 
other, — a nation which exists in hopes, prospects, 
and expectations ; the reverence for ancient estab- 
lishments gone ; existing forms shaken to the very 
foimdation; and a new order of things about to 
take place, in which, perhaps, even the very names 
of all former institutions will be disregarded." 
And again : "This country presents an astonishing 
spectacle to one who has collected his ideas from 
books and information half a dozen years old. 
Everything is a V Anglaise, and a desire to imitate 
the English prevails alike in the cut of a coat and 
the form of a constitution. Like the English, too, 



First Stay in France 173 

all are engaged in parliamenteering ; and when we 
consider how novel this last business must be, I 
assure you the progress is far from contemptible," 
— a reference to Lafayette's electioneering trip to 
Auvergne. The rapidity with w^hich, in America, 
order had come out of chaos, while in France the 
reverse process had been going on, impressed him 
deeply ; as he says : "If any new lesson were want- 
ing to impress on our hearts a deep sense of the 
mutability of human affairs, the double contrast 
between France and America two years ago and at 
the present would surely furnish it." 

He saw at once that the revolutionists had it in 
their power to do about as they chose. " If there 
be any real vigor in the nation the prevailing party 
in the States General may, if they please, overturn 
the monarchy itself, should the king commit his 
authority to a contest with them. The court is ex- 
tremely feeble, and the manners are so extremely 
corrupt that they cannot succeed if there be any 
consistent opposition, unless the whole nation be 
equally depraved." 

He did not believe that the people would be able 
to profit by the revolution, or to use their oppor- 
tunities aright. For the numerous class of patriots 
who felt a vague, though fervent, enthusiasm for 
liberty in the abstract, and who, without the slight- 
est practical knowledge, were yet intent on having 
all their own pet theories put into practice, he felt 



174 Gouverneur Morris 

profound scorn and contempt ; while he distrusted 
and despised the mass of Frenchmen, because of 
their frivoHty and viciousness. He knew well that 
a pure theorist may often do as much damage to a 
country as the most corrupt traitor; and very 
properly considered that in politics the fool is 
quite as obnoxious as the knave. He also realized 
that levity and the inability to look life seriously 
in the face, or to attend to the things worth doing, 
may render a man just as incompetent to fulfil the 
duties of citizenship as would actual viciousness. 

To the crazy theories of the constitution-makers 
and closet republicans generally, he often alludes 
in his diary, and in his letters home. In one place 
he notes: "The literary people here, observing 
the abuses of the monarchical form, imagine that 
everything must go the better in proportion as it 
recedes from the present establishment, and in 
their closets they make men exactly suited to their 
systems ; but unluckily they are such men as exist 
nowhere else, and least of all in France." And he 
writes almost the same thing to Washington : "The 
middle party, who mean well, have imfortimately 
acquired their ideas of government from books, 
and are admirable fellows upon paper: but as it 
happens, somewhat unfortimately, that the men 
who live in the world are very different from those 
who dwell in the heads of philosophers, it is not to 
be wondered at if the systems taken out of books 



First Stay in France 175 

are fit for nothing but to be put back into books 
again." And once more: "They have all that 
romantic spirit, and all those romantic ideas of 
government, which, happily for America, we were 
cured of before it was too late." He shows how 
they had never had the chance to gain wisdom 
through experience, "As they have hitherto felt 
severely the authority exercised in the name of 
their princes, every limitation of that power seems 
to them desirable. Never having felt the evils of 
too weak an executive, the disorders to be appre- 
hended from anarchy make as yet no impression." 
Elsewhere he comments on their folly in trying to 
apply to their own necessities systems of govern- 
ment suited to totally different conditions; and 
mentions his own attitude in the matter : "I have 
steadily combated the violence and excess of those 
persons who, either inspired with an enthusiastic 
love of freedom, or prompted by sinister designs, 
are disposed to drive everything to extremity. 
Our American example has done them good ; but, 
like all novelties, liberty runs away with their dis- 
cretion, if they have any. They want an Ameri- 
can constitution with the exception of a king 
instead of a president, without reflecting that 
they have not American citizens to support that 
constitution. . . . Whoever desires to apply in 
the practical science of government those rules 
and forms which prevail and succeed in a foreign 



176 Gouverneur Morris 

country, must fall into the same pedantry with 
our young scholars, just fresh from the imiversity, 
who would fain bring everything to the Roman 
standard. . . . The scientific tailor who should 
cut after Grecian or Chinese models would not 
have many customers, either in London or Paris ; 
and those who look to America for their political 
forms are not unlike the tailors in Laputa, who, 
as Gulliver tells us, always take measures with a 
quadrant." 

He shows again and again his abiding distrust 
and fear of the French character, as it was at that 
time, volatile, debauched, ferocious, and incapable 
of self-restraint. To Lafayette he insisted that the 
"extreme licentiousness " of the people rendered it 
indispensable that they should be kept tinder au- 
thority; and on another occasion told him "that 
the nation was used to being governed, and would 
have to be governed ; and that if he expected to 
lead them by their affections, he would himself be 
the dupe." In writing to Washington he painted 
the outlook in colors that, though black indeed, 
were not a shade too dark. "The materials for a 
revolution in this cotmtry are very indifferent. 
Everybody agrees that there is an utter prostra- 
tion of morals; but this general proposition can 
never convey to an American mind the degree of 
depravity. It is not by any figure of rhetoric or 
force of language that the idea can be commimi- 



First Stay in France 177 

cated. A hundred anecdotes and a hundred thou- 
sand examples are required to show the extreme 
rottenness of every member. There are men and 
Vomen who are greatly and eminently virtuous. 
I have the pleasure to number many in my own 
acquaintance; but they stand forward from a 
background deeply and darkly shaded. It is, how- 
ever, from such crumbling matter that the great 
edifice of freedom is to be erected here. Perhaps 
like the stratum of rock which is spread under the 
whole surface of their coimtry, it may harden when 
exposed to the air; but it seems quite as likely 
that it will fall and crush the builders. I own to 
you that I am not without such apprehensions, for 
there is one fatal principle which pervades all 
ranks. It is a perfect indifference to the violation 
of engagements. Inconstancy is so mingled in the 
blood, marrow, and very essence of this people, 
that when a man of high rank and importance 
laughs to-day at what he seriously asserted yester- 
day, it is considered as in the natural order of 
things. Consistency is a phenomenon. Judge, 
then, what would be the value of an association 
should such a thing be proposed and even adopted. 
The great mass of the common people have no 
religion but their priests, no law but their supe- 
riors, no morals but their interest. These are the 
creatures who, led by drunken curates, are now 
on the high road ci la liberie." 
12 



178 Gouverneur Morris 

Morris and Washington wrote very freely to 
each other. In one of his letters, the latter gave 
an account of how well affairs were going in 
America (save in Rhode Island, the majority of 
whose people ' ' had long since bid adieu to every 
principle of honor, common sense, and honesty"), 
and then went on to discuss things in France. He 
expressed the opinion that, if the revolution went 
no farther than it had already gone, France would 
become the most powerful and happy state in 
Europe; but he trembled lest, having triumphed 
in the first paroxysms, it might succumb to others 
still more violent that would be sure to follow. He 
feared equally the "licentiousness of the people" 
and the folly of the leaders, and doubted if they 
possessed the requisite temperance, firmness, and 
foresight; and if they did not, then he believed 
they would run from one extreme to another, and 
end with ' ' a higher toned despotism than the one 
which existed before." 

Morris answered him with his usual half-satiric 
humor: "Your sentiments on the revolution here 
I believe to be perfectly just, because they per- 
fectly accord with my own, and that is, you know, 
the only standard which Heaven has given us by 
which to judge," and went on to describe how the 
parties in France stood. " The king is in effect a 
prisoner in Paris and obeys entirely the National 
Assembly. This Assembly may be divided into 



First Stay in France 179 

three parts : one, called the aristocrats, consists of 
the high clergy, the members of the law (note, 
these are not the lawyers) and such of the nobility 
as think they ought to form a separate order. 
Another, which has no name, but which consists 
of all sorts of people, really friends to a good free 
government. The third is composed of what is 
here called the enrages, that is, the madmen. 
These are the most numerous, and are of that 
class which in America is known by the name of 
pettifogging lawyers; together with , . . those 
persons who in all revolutions throng to the stand- 
ard of change because they are not well. This 
last party is in close alliance with the populace 
here, and they have already unhinged everything, 
and, according to custom on such occasions, the 
torrent rushes on irresistibly until it shall have 
wasted itself." The literati he pronounced to have 
no understanding whatever of the matters at issue, 
and as was natural to a shrewd observer educated 
in the intensely practical school of American polit- 
ical life, he felt utter contempt for the wordy 
futiHty and wild theories of the French legislators. 
"For the rest, they discuss nothing in their 
assembly. One large half of the time is spent in 
hallooing and bawling." 

Washington and Morris were both so alarmed 
and indignant at the excesses committed by the 
revolutionists, and so frankly expressed their 



i8o Gouverneur Morris 

feelings, as to create an impression in some quar- 
ters that they were hostile to the revolution itself. 
The exact reverse was originally the case. They 
sympathized most warmly with the desire for free- 
dom, and with the efforts made to attain it. Morris 
wrote to the President: "We have, I think, every 
reason to wish that the patriots may be successful. 
The generous wish that a free people must have to 
disseminate freedom, the grateful emotion which 
rejoices in the happiness of a benefactor, the inter- 
est we must feel as well in the liberty as in the 
power of this country, all conspire to make us far 
from indifferent spectators. I say that we have an 
interest in the liberty of France. The leaders here 
are our friends. Many of them have imbibed their 
principles in America, and all have been fired by 
our example. Their opponents are by no means 
rejoiced at the success of our revolution, and many 
of them are disposed to form connections of the 
strictest kind with Great Britain." Both Wash- 
ington and Morris would have been delighted to 
see liberty established in France ; but they had no 
patience with the pursuit of the bloody chimera 
which the revolutionists dignified with that title. 
The one hoped for, and the other counseled, mod- 
eration among the friends of republican freedom, 
not because they were opposed to it, but because 
they saw that it could only be gained and kept by 
self-restraint. They were, to say the least, per- 



First Stay in France i8i 

fectly excusable for believing that at that time 
some form of monarchy, whether under king, dic- 
tator, or emperor, was necessary to France. Every 
one agrees that there are certain men wiser than 
their fellows ; the only question is as to how these 
men can be best chosen out, and to this there can 
be no absolute answer. No mode will invariably 
give the best results ; and the one that will come 
nearest to doing so under given conditions will not 
work at all tmder others. Where the people are 
enlightened and moral they are themselves the 
ones to choose their rulers; and such a form of 
government is unquestionably the highest of any, 
and the only one that a high-spirited and really 
free nation will tolerate ; but if they are corrupt 
and degraded, they are unfit for republicanism, 
and need to be under an entirely different system. 
The most genuine republican, if he has any com- 
mon sense, does not believe in a democratic gov- 
ernment for every race and in every age. 

Morris was a true republican, and an American 
to the core. He was alike free from truckling 
subserviency to European opinion, — a degrading 
remnant of colonialism that imfortimately still 
lingers in certain limited social and literary circles, 
— and from the uneasy self-assertion that springs 
partly from sensitive vanity, and partly from a 
smothered doubt as to one's real position. Like 
most men of strong character, he had no taste for 



i82 Gouverneur Morris 

the "cosmopolitanism " that so generally indicates 
a weak moral and mental make-up. He enjoyed 
his stay in Europe to the utmost, and was intimate 
with the most influential men and charming women 
of the time ; but he was heartily glad to get back 
to America, refused to leave it again, and always 
insisted that it was the most pleasant of all places 
in which to live. While abroad he was simply a 
gentleman among gentlemen. He never intruded 
his political views or national prejudices upon his 
European friends; but he was not inclined to 
suffer any imputation on his cotmtry. Any ques- 
tion about America that was put in good faith, no 
matter how much ignorance it displayed, he always 
answered good-humoredly ; and he gives in his 
diary some amusing examples of such conversa- 
tions. Once he was cross-examined by an inquisi- 
tive French nobleman, still in the stage of civiliza- 
tion which believes that no man can be paid to 
render a service to another, especially a small 
service, and yet retain his self-respect and continue 
to regard himself as the full political equal of his 
employer. One of this gentleman's sagacious in- 
quiries was as to how a shoemaker could, in the 
pride of his freedom, think himself equal to a king, 
and yet accept an order to make shoes ; to which 
Morris replied that he would accept it as a matter 
of business, and be glad of the chance to make 
them, since it lay in the line of his duty ; and that 



First Stay in France 183 

he would all the time consider himself at full 
liberty to criticize his visitor, or the king, or any- 
one else, who lapsed from his own diity. After 
recording several queries of the same nature, and 
some rather abrupt answers, the diary for that day 
closes rather caustically with the comment: "This 
manner of thinking and speaking, however, is too 
masculine for the climate I am now in." 

In a letter to Washington Morris made one of 
his usual happy guesses — if forecasting the future 
by the aid of marvelous insight into himian char- 
acter can properly be called a guess — as to what 
would happen to France : " It is very difficult to 
guess whereabouts the flock will settle when it flies 
so wild; but as far as it is possible to guess this 
(late) kingdom will be cast into a congeries of 
little democracies, laid out, not according to rivers, 
mountains, etc., but with the square and compass 
according to latitude and longitude," and adds 
that he thinks so much fermenting matter will 
soon give the nation "a kind of political colic." 

He rendered some services to Washington that 
did not come in the line of his public duty. One of 
these was to get him a watch, Washington having 
written to have one purchased in Paris, of gold," 
"not a small, trifling, nor a finical ornamental one, 
but a watch well executed in point of workman- 
ship, large and flat, with a plain, handsome key." 
Morris sent it to him by Jefferson, " with two 



i84 Gouverneur Morris 

copper keys and one golden one, and a box con- 
taining a spare spring and glasses." His next ser- 
vice to the great Virginian, or rather to his family, 
was of a different kind, and he records it with a 
smile at his own expense. "Go to M. Houdon's ; he 
has been waiting for me a long time. I stand for his 
statue of General Washington, being the humble 
employment of a manikin. This is literally taking 
the advice of St. Paul, to be all things to all men." 
He corresponded with many men of note; not 
the least among whom was the daring corsair, Paul 
Jones. The latter was very anxious to continue in 
the service of the people with whom he had cast in 
his lot, and in command of whose vessels he had 
reached fame. Morris was obliged to tell him that 
he did not believe an American navy would be 
created for some years to come, and advised him 
meanwhile to go into the service of the Russians, 
as he expected there would soon be warm work on 
the Baltic ; and even gave him a hint as to what 
would probably be the best plan of campaign. 
Paul Jones wanted to come to Paris; but from 
this Morris dissuaded him. "A journey to this 
city can, I think, produce nothing but the expense 
attending it ; for neither pleasure nor profit can be 
expected here, by one of your profession in par- 
ticular; and, except that it is a more dangerous 
residence than many others, I know of nothing 
which may serve to you as an inducement." 



CHAPTER VIII. 

LIFE IN PARIS. 

ALTHOUGH Morris entered into the social life 
of Paris with all the zest natural to his 
pleasure-loving character, yet he was far 
too clear-headed to permit it to cast any glamour 
over him. Indeed, it is rather remarkable that a 
young provincial gentleman, from a raw, new, 
far-off country, should not have had his head 
turned by being made somewhat of a lion in what 
was then the foremost city of the civilized world. 
Instead of this happening, his notes show that he 
took a perfectly cool view of his new surroimdings, 
and appreciated the over-civilized, aristocratic 
society, in which he foimd himself, quite at its 
true worth. He enjoyed the life of the salon very 
much, but it did not in the least awe or impress 
him ; and he was of too virile fiber, too essentially 
a man, to be long contented with it alone. He 
likewise appreciated the fashionable men, and 
especially the fashionable women, whom he met 
there; but his amusing comments on them, as 
shrewd as they are humorous, prove how little he 
respected their philosophy, and how completely 
indifferent he was to their claims to social pre- 
eminence. 

185 



186 Gouverneur Morris 

Much has been written about the pleasure- 
loving, highly cultured society of eighteenth- 
century France; but to a man like Morris, of real 
ability and with an element of sturdiness in his 
make-up, both the culture and knowledge looked 
a little like veneering ; the polish partook of effem- 
inacy; the pleasure so eagerly sought after could 
be called pleasure only by people of ignoble ambi- 
tion; and the life that was lived seemed narrow 
and petty, agreeable enough for a change, but 
dreary beyond measure if followed too long. The 
authors, philosophers, and statesmen of the salon 
were rarely, almost never, men of real greatness ; 
their metal did not ring true; they were shams, 
and the life of which they were a part was a sham. 
Not only was the existence hollow, unwholesome, 
effeminate, but also in the end tedious : the silent, 
decorous dulness of life in the dreariest country 
town is not more insufferable than, after a time, 
become the endless chatter, the small witticisms, 
the mock enthusiasms, and vapid aft'ectations of 
an aristocratic society as artificial and unsound as 
that of the Parisian drawing-rooms in the last 
century. 

But all this was delightful for a time, especially 
to a man who had never seen any city larger than 
the overgrown villages of New York and Philadel- 
phia. Morris thus sums up his first impressions 
in a letter to a friend: "A man in Paris lives in 



Life in Paris 187 

a sort of whirlwind, which turns him round so fast 
that he can see nothing. And as all men and 
things are in the same vertiginous condition, you 
can neither fix yourself nor your object for regular 
examination. Hence the people of this metropolis 
are imder the necessity of pronouncing their defini- 
tive judgment from the first glance; and being 
thus habituated to shoot flying, they have what 
sportsmen call a quick sight. Ex pede Herculem. 
They know a wit by his snuff-box, a man of taste 
by his bow, and a statesman by the cut of his coat. 
It is true that, like other sportsmen, they some- 
times miss; but then, like other sportsmen too, 
they have a thousand excuses besides the want of 
skill : the fault, you know, may be in the dog, or 
the bird, or the powder, or the flint, or even the 
gun, without mentioning the gunner." 

Among the most famous of the salons where he 
was fairly constant in his attendance was that of 
Madame de Stael. There was not a little con- 
tempt mixed with his regard for the renowned 
daughter of Necker. She amused him, however, 
and he thought well of her capacity, though in his 
diary he says that he never in his life saw ' ' such 
exuberant vanity" as she displayed about her 
father, Necker, — a very ordinary personage, whom 
the convulsions of the time had for a moment 
thrown forward as the most prominent man in 
France. By way of instance he mentions a couple 



i88 Gouverneur Morris 

of her remarks, one to the effect that a speech of 
Talleyrand on the church property was "excellent, 
admirable, in short that there were two pages in 
it which were worthy of M. Necker ; " and another 
wherein she said that wisdom was a very rare 
quality, and that she knew of no one who possessed 
it in a superlative degree except her father. 

The first time he met her was after an exciting 
discussion in the Assembly over the finances, which 
he describes at some length. Necker had intro- 
duced an absurd scheme for a loan. j\Iirabeau, 
who hated Necker, saw the futihty of his plan, but 
was also aware that popular opinion was blindly in 
his favor, and that to oppose him would be ruin- 
ous; so in a speech of "fine irony" he advocated 
passing Necker' s proposed bill without change or 
discussion, avowing that his object was to have 
the responsibility and glory thrown entirely on the 
proposer of the measure. He thus yielded to the 
popular view, while at the same time he shouldered 
on Necker all the responsibiUty for a deed which 
it was evident would in the end ruin him. It was 
a not very patriotic move, although a good exam- 
ple of selfish poHtical tactics, and Morris sneered 
bitterly at its adoption by the representatives of a 
people who prided themselves on being " the mod- 
em Athenians." To his surprise, however, even 
Madame de Stael took Mirabeau's action seriously ; 
she went into raptures over the wisdom of the 



Life in Paris 189 

Assembly in doing just what Necker said, for " the 
only thing they could do was to comply with her 
father's wish, and there could be no doubt as to 
the success of her father's plans! Bravo!" 

With Morris she soon passed from politics to 
other subjects. " Presented to Madame de Stael 
as un homme d' esprit,'" he writes, "she singles me 
out and makes a talk; asks if I have not written 
a book on the American Constitution. ' Non ma- 
dame, j'ai fait mon devoir en assistant a la forma- 
tion de cette constitution.' ' Mais, monsieur, votre 
conversation doit etre tres interessante, car je vous 
entends cite de toute part.' 'Ah, madame, je ne 
suis pas digne de cette eloge.' How I lost my leg ? 
It was unfortimately not in the military service of 
my countr}'. ' ■\Ionsieur, vous avez I'air tres im- 
posant,' and this is accompanied with that look 
which, without being what Sir John Falstaff calls 
the ' leer of invitation,' amounts to the same thing. 
. . . This leads us on, but in the midst of the chat 
arrive letters, one of which is from her lover, Nar- 
bonne, now with his regiment. It brings her to a 
little recollection, which a little time will, I think, 
again banish, and a few interviews would stimulate 
her to try the experiment of her fascinations even 
on the native of a new world who has left one of 
his legs behind him." 

An entry in Alorris's diar^- previous to this con- 
versation shows that he had no ver\^ high opinion 



I90 Gouverneur Morris 

of this same Monsieur de Narbonne: "He con- 
siders a civil war inevitable, and is about to join 
his regiment, being, as he says, in a conflict be- 
tween the dictates of his duty and his conscience. 
I tell him that I know of no duty but that which 
conscience dictates. I presume that his conscience 
will dictate to join the strongest side." 

Morris's surmises as to his fair friend's happy 
forgetfulness of her absent lover proved true : she 
soon became bent on a flirtation with the good- 
looking American stranger, and when he failed 
to make any advances she promptly made them 
herself; told him that she "rather invited than 
repelled those who were inclined to be attentive," 
and capped this exhibition of modest feminine 
reserve by suggesting that "perhaps he might 
become an admirer. ' ' Morris dryly responded that 
it was not impossible, but that, as a previous con- 
dition, she must agree not to repel him, — which 
she instantly promised. Afterward, at dinner, 
' ' we become engaged in an animated conversation, 
and she desires me to speak English, which her 
husband does not understand. In looking round 
the room, I observe in him very much emotion, 
and I tell her that he loves her distractedly, which 
she says she knows, and that it renders her miser- 
able. ... I condole with her a little on her widow- 
hood, the Chevalier de Narbonne being absent in 
Franche Comte. . . . She asks me if I continue to 



Life in Paris 191 

think she has a preference for Monsieur de Ton- 
nerre. I reply only by observing that each of 
them has wit enough for one couple, and therefore 
I think they had better separate, and take each a 
partner who is im pen bete. After dinner I seek a 
conversation with the husband, which relieves him. 
He inveighs bitterly [poor, honest Swede] against 
the m.anners of the country, and the cruelty of 
alienating a wife's affection. I regret with him on 
general grounds that prostitution of morals which 
unfits them for good government, and convince 
him, I think, I shall not contribute to making 
him any more uncomfortable than he already is." 
Certainly, according to Morris's evidence, Madame 
de Stael's sensitive delicacy could only be truth- 
fully portrayed by the -unfettered pen of a 
Smollett. 

He was an especial habitue of the salon of 
Madame de Flahaut, the friend of Talleyrand and 
Montesquieu. She was a perfectly characteristic 
type ; a clever, accomplished little woman, fond of 
writing romances, and a thorough-paced intrig- 
ante. She had innumerable enthusiasms, with 
perhaps a certain amount of sincerity in each, and 
was a more infatuated political schemer than any 
of her male friends. She was thoroughly conver- 
sant with the politics of both court and Assembly ; 
her "precision and justness of thought was very 
uncommon in either sex," and, as time went on, 



192 Gouverneur Morris 

made her a willing and useful helper in some of 
Morris's plans. Withal she was a mercenary, self- 
seeking little personage, bent on increasing her 
own fortime by the aid of her political friends. 
Once, when dining with Morris and Talleyrand, 
she told them in perfect good faith that, if the 
latter was made minister, ' ' they must be sure to 
make a million for her." 

She was much flattered by the deference that 
Morris showed for her judgment, and in return 
let him into not a few state secrets. She and he 
together drew up a translation of the outline for 
a constitution for France, which he had prepared, 
and through her it was forwarded to the king. 
Together with her two other intimates, Talleyrand 
and Montesquieu, they made just a party of four, 
often dining at her house ; and when her husband 
was sent to Spain, the dinners became more nume- 
rous than ever, sometimes merely parties carries, 
sometimes very large entertainments. Morris re- 
cords that, small or large, they were invariably 
"excellent dinners, where the conversation was 
always extremely gay." 

Once they planned out a ministry together, and 
it must be kept in mind that it was quite on the 
cards that their plan would be adopted. After 
disposing suitably of all the notabilities, some in 
stations at home, others in stations abroad, the 
scheming little lady turned to Morris: " 'Enfin,' 



Life in Paris 193 

she says, ' mon ami, vous et moi nous gouvemerons 
la France.* It is an odd combination, but the 
kingdom is actually in much worse hands," 

This conversation occurred one morning when 
he had called to find madame at her toilet, with 
her dentist in attendance. It was a coarse age, 
for all the gilding; and the coarseness was in- 
grained in the fiber even of the most ultra sen- 
timental. At first Morris felt perhaps a little 
surprised at the easy familiarity with which the 
various ladies whose friend he was admitted him 
to the privacy of boudoir and bedroom, and chron- 
icles with some amusement the graceful indifference 
with which one of them would say to him : " Mon- 
sieur Morris me permettra de faire ma toilette?" 
But he was far from being a strait-laced man, — in 
fact, he was altogether too much the reverse, — 
and he soon grew habituated to these as well as to 
much worse customs. However, he notes that the 
different operations of the toilet "were carried on 
with an entire and astoimding regard to modesty." 

Madame de Flahaut was a very charming mem- 
ber of the class who, neither toiling nor spinning, 
were supported in liixury by those who did both, 
and who died from want while so doing. At this 
very time, while France was rapidly drifting into 
bankruptcy, the fraudulent pensions given to a 
horde of courtiers, titled placemen, well-bom har- 
lots and their offspring, reached the astounding 
13 



194 Gouverneur Morris 

total of two hundred and seventy odd millions of 
livres. The Assembly passed a decree cutting 
away these pensions right and left, and thereby 
worked sad havoc in the gay society that nothing 
could render serious but immediate and pressing 
poverty, — not even the loom of the terror ahead, 
growing darker moment by moment. Calling on 
his fascinating little friend immediately after the 
decree was pubHshed, Morris finds her " au deses- 
poir, and she intends to cry very loud, she says. 
. . . She has been in tears all day. Her pensions 
from Monsieur and the Comte d' Artois are stopped. 
On that from the king she receives but three thou- 
sand francs, — and must therefore quit Paris. I 
try to console her, but it is impossible. Indeed, 
the stroke is severe ; for, with youth, beauty, wit, 
and every loveliness, she must quit all she loves, 
and pass her life with what she abhors." In the 
time of adversity Morris stood loyally by the 
friends who had treated him so kindly when the 
world was a merry one and things went well with 
them. He helped them in every way possible ; his 
time and his purse were always at their service; 
and he performed the difficult feat of giving pecu- 
niary assistance with a tact and considerate deli- 
cacy that prevented the most sensitive from taking 
offense. 

He early became acquainted with the Duchess 
of Orleans, wife of Philippe EgaHte, the vicious 



Life in Paris 195 

voluptuary of liberal leanings and clouded char- 
acter. He met her at the house of an old friend, 
Madame de Chastellux. At first he did not fancy 
her, and rather held himself aloof, being uncertain 
' ' how he would get on with royalty." The duchess, 
however, was attracted by him, asked after him 
repeatedly, made their mutual friends throw them 
together, and finally so managed that he became 
one of her constant visitors and attendants. This 
naturally flattered him, and he remained sincerely 
loyal to her always afterward. She was particu- 
larly anxious that he should be interested in her 
son, then a boy, afterward destined to become the 
citizen king, — not a bad man, but a mean one, 
and rather an unkingly king even for the nine- 
teenth century, fertile though it has been in igno- 
ble royalty. Morris's further dealings with this 
precious youth will have to be considered hereafter. 
After his first interview he notes that the duch- 
ess was ' ' handsome enough to punish the duke for 
his irregularities." He also mentioned that she 
still seemed in love with her husband. However, 
the lady was not averse to seeking a little senti- 
mental consolation from her new friend, to whom 
she confided, in their after intimacy, that she was 
weary at heart and not happy, and — a thoroughly 
French touch — that she had the "besoin d'etre 
aim6e." On the day they first met, while he is 
talking to her, ' ' the widow of the late Duke of 



196 Gouverneur Morris 

Orleans comes in, and at going away, according 
to custom, kisses the duchess. I observe that the 
ladies of Paris are very fond of each other ; which 
gives rise to some observations from her royal 
highness on the person who has just quitted the 
room, which show that the kiss does not always be- 
token great affection. In going away she is pleased 
to say that she is glad to have met me, and I 
believe her. The reason is that I dropped some 
expressions and sentiments a little rough, which 
were agreeable because they contrasted with the 
palling polish she meets with everywhere. Hence 
I conclude that the less I have the honor of such 
good company the better; for when the novelty 
ceases all is over, and I shall probably be worse 
than insipid." 

Nevertheless, the "good company" was deter- 
mined he should make one of their number. He 
was not very loath himself, when he foimd he was 
in no danger of being patronized, — for anything 
like patronage was always particularly galling to 
his pride, which was of the kind that resents a 
tone of condescension more fiercely than an overt 
insult, — and he became a fast friend of the house 
of Orleans. The duchess made him her confidant ; 
unfolded to him her woes about the duke; and 
once, when he was dining with her, complained to 
him bitterly of the duke's conduct in not paying 
her allowance regularly. She was in financial 



Life in Paris 197 

straits at the time; for, though she was allowed 
four hundred and fifty thousand livres a year, yet 
three hundred and fifty thousand were appropri- 
ated for the house-servants, table, etc., — an item 
wherein her American friend, albeit not over- 
frugal, thought a very little economy would result 
in a great saving. 

His description of one of the days he spent at 
Raincy with the duchess and her friends gives us 
not only a glimpse of the life of the great ladies 
and fine gentlemen of the day, but also a clear 
insight into the reasons why these same highly 
polished ladies and gentlemen had utterly lost 
hold over the people whose God-given rulers they 
deemed themselves to be. 

Dejeuner h la fourchette was not served till noon, 
— Morris congratulating himself that he had taken 
a light breakfast earlier. ' ' After breakfast we go 
to mass in the chapel. In the tribune above we 
have a bishop, an abbe, the duchess, her maids 
and some of their friends. Madame de Chastellux 
is below on her knees. We are amused above by 
a number of little tricks played off by Monsieur de 
Segur and Monsieur de Cabieres with a candle, 
which is put into the pockets of different gentle- 
men, the bishop among the rest, and lighted, while 
they are otherwise engaged (for there is a fire in 
the tribune), to the great merriment of the spec- 
tators. Immoderate laughter is the consequence. 



198 Gouverneur Morris 

The duchess preserves as much gravity as she can. 
This scene must be very edifying to the domestics 
who are opposite to us, and the villagers who wor- 
ship below." The afternoon's amusements were 
not to his taste. They all walked, which he found 
very hot; then they got into bateaux, and the 
gentlemen rowed the ladies, which was still hotter ; 
and then there came more walking, so he was glad 
to get back to the chateau. The formal dinner was 
served after five ; the conversation thereat varied 
between the vicious and the frivolous. There was 
much bantering, well-bred in manner and exces- 
sively under-bred in matter, between the different 
guests of both sexes, about the dubious episodes 
in their past careers, and the numerous shady spots 
in their respective characters. Epigrams and 
"epitaphs" were bandied about freely, some in 
verse, some not ; probably very amusing then, but 
their luster sadly tarnished in the eyes of those 
who read them now. While they were dining, 
"a number of persons surround the windows, 
doubtless from a high idea of the company, to 
whom they are obliged to look up at an awful 
distance. Oh, did they but know how trivial the 
conversation, how very trivial the characters, their 
respect would soon be changed to an emotion 
entirely different ! " 

This was but a month before the Bastille fell; 
and yet, on the threshold of their hideous doom, 



Life in Paris 199 

the people who had most at stake were incapable 
not only of intelligent action to ward off their fate, 
but even of serious thought as to what their fate 
would be. The men — the nobles, the clerical dig- 
nitaries, and the princes of the blood — chose the 
church as a place wherein to cut antics that would 
have better befitted a pack of monkeys ; while the 
women, their wives and mistresses, exchanged with 
them impure jests at their own expense, relished 
because of the truth on Vv^hich they rested. Brutes 
might still have held sway at least for a time ; but 
these were merely vicious triflers. They did not 
believe in their religion; they did not believe 
in themselves ; they did not believe in anything. 
They had no earnestness, no seriousness ; their sen- 
sibilities and enthusiasms were alike affectations. 
There was still plenty of fire and purpose and 
furious energy in the hearts of the French people ; 
but these and all the other virile virtues lay not 
among the noblesse, but among the ranks of the 
common herd beneath them, do\vntrodden, bloody 
in their wayward ferocity, but still capable of 
fierce, heroic devotion to an ideal in which they 
believed, and for which they would spill the blood 
of others, or pour out their own, with the proud 
waste of utter recklessness. 

Many of Alorris's accoimts of the literary life of 
the salon read as if they were explanatory notes to 
"Les Precieuses Ridicules." There was a certain 



200 Gouverneur Morris 

pretentiousness about it that made it a bit of a 
sham at the best ; and the feebler variety of salon, 
built on such a foundation, thus became that most 
despicable of things, an imitation of a pretense. 
At one of the dinners which Morris describes, the 
company was of a kind that would have done no 
discredit to an entertainment of the great social 
and literary light of Eatanswill. " Set off in great 
haste to dine with the Comtesse de R., on an invi- 
tation of a week's standing. Arrive at about a 
quarter past three, and find in the drawing-room 
some dirty Hnen and no fire. While a waiting- 
woman takes away one, a valet lights up the other. 
Three small sticks in a deep bed of ashes give no 
great expectation of heat. By the smoke, how- 
ever, all doubts are removed respecting the exist- 
ence of fire. To expel the smoke, a window is 
opened, and, the day being cold, I have the benefit 
of as fresh air as can reasonably be expected in so 
large a city. 

"Toward four o'clock the guests begin to as- 
semble, and I begin to expect that, as madame is a 
poetess, I shall have the honor to dine with that 
exalted part of the species who devote themselves 
to the muses. In effect, the gentlemen begin to 
compliment their respective works ; and, as regular 
hours cannot be expected in a house where the 
mistress is occupied more with the intellectual 
than the material world, I have a delightful pros- 



Life in Paris 201 

pect of a continuance of the scene. Toward five, 
niadame steps in to announce dinner, and the hun- 
gry poets advance to the charge. As they bring 
good appetites, they have certainly reason to praise 
the feast. And I console myself with the persua- 
sion that for this day at least I shall escape an 
indigestion, A very narrow escape, too, for some 
rancid butter, of which the cook had been liberal, 
puts me in bodily fear. If the repast is not abim- 
dant, we have at least the consolation that there is 
no lack of conversation. Not being perfectly mas- 
ter of the language, most of the jests escaped me. 
As for the rest of the company, each being em- 
ployed either in saying a good thing, or else in 
studying one to say, it is no wonder if he cannot 
find time to applaud that of his neighbors. They 
all agree that we live in an age alike deficient in 
justice and in taste. Each finds in the fate of his 
own works niimerous instances to justify this cen- 
sure. They tell me, to my great surprise, that the 
public now condemn theatrical compositions before 
they have heard the first recital. And, to remove 
my doubts, the comtesse is so kind as to assure me 
that this rash decision has been made on one of 
her own pieces. In pitying modem degeneracy, 
we rise from the table. 

* ' I take my leave immediately after the coffee, 
which by no means dishonors the precedent repast ; 
and madame informs me that on Tuesdays and 



202 Gouverneur Morris 

Thursdays she is always at home, and will always 
be glad to see me. While I stammer out some 
return to the compliment, my heart, convinced of 
my unworthiness to partake of such attic enter- 
tainments, makes me promise never again to 
occupy the place from which perhaps I had ex- 
cluded a worthier personage." 

Among Morris's other qualities, he was the first 
to develop that peculiarly American vein of humor 
which is especially fond of gravely pretending to 
believe without reserve some preposterously untrue 
assertion, — as throughout the above quotation. 

Though the society in which he was thrown 
interested him, he always regarded it with half- 
sarcastic amusement, and at times it bored him 
greatly. Meditating on the conversation in "this 
upper region of wits and graces," he concludes 
that "the sententious style" is the one best fitted 
for it, and that in it "observations with more of 
justice than splendor cannot amuse," and sums up 
by saying that "he could not please, because he 
was not sufficiently pleased." 

His comments upon the various distinguished 
men he met are always interesting, on account of 
the quick, accurate judgment of character which 
they show. It was this insight into the feelings 
and ideas alike of the leaders and of their followers 
which made his political predictions often so ac- 
curate. His judgment of many of his contempo- 



Life in Paris 203 

raries comes marvelously near the cooler estimate 
of history. 

He was originally prejudiced in favor of the 
king, poor Louis XVI., and, believing him "to be 
an honest and good man, he sincerely wished him 
well," but he very soon began to despise him for 
his weakness. This quality was the exact one that 
under existing circumstances was absolutely fatal ; 
and Morris mentions it again and again, pronoimc- 
ing the king "a well-meaning man, but extremely 
weak, without genius or education to show the way 
toward that good which he desires," and "a prince 
so weak that he can influence very little either by 
his presence or absence." Finally, in a letter to 
Washington, he gives a biting sketch of the unfor- 
timate monarch. "If the reigning prince were 
not the small-beer character that he is, there can 
be but little doubt that, watching events and 
making a tolerable use of them, he would regain 
his authority; but what will you have from a 
creature who, situated as he is, eats and drinks, 
sleeps well and laughs, and is as merry a grig as 
lives? The idea that they will give him some 
money, which he can economize, and that he will 
have no trouble in governing, contents him en- 
tirely. Poor man ! He little thinks how unstable 
is his situation. He is beloved, but it is not with 
the sort of love which a monarch should inspire. 
It is that kind of good-natured pity which one 



204 Gouverneur Morris 

feels for a led captive. There is besides no possi- 
bility of serving him, for at the sHghtest show of 
opposition he gives up everything and every 
person." Morris had too robust a mind to feel 
the least regard for mere amiability and good in- 
tentions when imaccompanied by any of the ruder, 
manlier virtues. 

The Comte d'Artois had " neither sense to coun- 
sel himself, nor to choose counselors for himself, 
much less to coimsel others." This gentleman, 
afterward Charles X., stands as perhaps the most 
shining example of the monumental ineptitude of 
his royal house. His fellow Bourbon, the amiable 
Bomba of Naples, is his only equal for dull silli- 
ness, crass immorahty, and the lack of every 
manly or kingly virtue. Democracy has much to 
answer for, but after all it would be hard to find, 
even among the aldermen of New York and 
Chicago, men whose moral and mental shortcom- 
ings would put them lower than this royal couple. 
To our shame be it said, our system of popular 
government once let our greatest city fall \mder 
the control of Tweed; but it would be rank in- 
justice to that clever rogue to compare him with 
the two vicious dullards whom the opposite system 
permitted to tyrannize at Paris and Naples. More- 
over, in the end, we of the democracy not only 
overthrew the evil-doer who oppressed us, but also 
put him in prison ; and in the long nm we have 



Life in Paris 205 

usually meted out the same justice to our lesser 
criminals. Government by manhood suffrage 
shows at its worst in large cities; and yet even 
in these experience certainly does not show that 
a despotism works a whit better, or as well. 

Morris described the Count de Montmorin pith- 
ily, saying : ' ' He has more imderstanding than 
people in general imagine, and he means well, very 
well, but he means it feebly." 

When Alorris came to France, Necker was the 
most prominent man in the kingdom. He was a 
hard-working, well-meaning, conceited person, not 
in the least fitted for public affairs, a banker but 
not a financier, and affords a beautiful illustration 
of the utter futility of the popular belief that a 
good business man will necessarily be a good 
statesman. Accident had made him the most con- 
spicuous figure of the government, admired and 
hated, but not looked down upon ; yet Morris saw 
through him at a glance. After their first meet- 
mg, he writes down in his diary: "He has the 
look and manner of the counting-house, and, 
being dressed in embroidered velvet, he contrasts 
strongly with his habiliments. His bow, his ad- 
dress, say, 'I am the man.' ... If he is really a 
very great man, I am deceived ; and yet this is a 
rash judgment. If he is not a laborious man, I 
am also deceived." He soon saw that both the 
blame and the praise bestowed on him were out 



2o6 Gouverneur Morris 

of all proportion to his consequence, and he wrote : 
* ' In their anguish [the nobles] curse Necker, who is 
in fact less the cause than the instrument of their 
sufferings. His popularity depends now more on 
the opposition he meets with from one party than 
any serious regard of the other. It is the attempt 
to throw him down which saves him from falling ; 
... as it is, he must soon fall." To Washington 
he gave a fuller analysis of his character. "As 
to M. Necker, he is one of those people who has 
obtained a much greater reputation than he has 
any right to. . . . In his public administration he 
has always been honest and disinterested ; which 
proves well, I think, for his former private con- 
duct, or else it proves that he has more vanity 
than cupidity. Be that as it may, an unspotted 
integrity as minister, and serving at his own 
expense in an office which others seek for the 
purpose of enriching themselves, have acquired 
for him very deservedly much confidence. Add 
to this that his writings on finance teem with that 
sort of sensibility which makes the fortime of 
modem romances, and which is exactly suited to 
this lively nation, who love to read but hate to 
think. Hence his reputation. He . . [has not] 
the talents of a great minister. His education as 
a banker has taught him to make tight bargains, 
and put him upon his guard against projects. 
But though he imderstands man as a covetous 



Life in Paris 207 

creature, he does not understand mankind, — a 
defect which is remediless. He is utterly ignorant 
of politics, by which I mean politics in the great 
sense, or that sublime science which embraces for 
its object the happiness of mankind. Conse- 
quently he neither knows what constitution to 
form, nor how to obtain the consent of others to 
such as he wishes. From the moment of con- 
vening the States General, he has been afloat upon 
the wide ocean of incidents. But what is most 
extraordinary is that M. Necker is a very poor 
financier. This I know will sound like heresy in 
the ears of most people, but it is true. The plans 
he has proposed are feeble and inept." 

A far more famous man, Talleyrand, then Bishop 
of Autun, he also gauged correctly from the start, 
writing dowTi that he appeared to be " a sly, cool, 
cimning, ambitious, and malicious man. I know 
not why conclusions so disadvantageous to him are 
formed in my mind, but so it is, and I cannot help 
it," He was afterward obliged to work much in 
common with Talleyrand, for both took substan- 
tially the same view of public affairs in that crisis, 
and were working for a common end. Speaking 
of his new ally's plan respecting church property, 
he says: "He is bigoted to it, and the thing is 
well enough ; but the mode is not so well. He is 
attached to this as an author, which is not a good 
sign for a man of business." And again he 



2o8 Gouverneur Morris 

criticizes Talleyrand's management of certain 
schemes for the finances, as showing a willingness 
"to sacrifice great objects for the sake of small 
ones ... an inverse ratio of moral proportion." 

Morris was fond of Lafayette, and appreciated 
highly his courage and keen sense of honor; but 
he did not think much of his ability, and became 
at times very impatient with his vanity and his 
impractical theories. Besides, he deemed him a 
man who was carried away by the current, and 
could neither stem nor guide it. "I have known 
my friend Lafayette now for many years, and can 
estimate at the just value both his words and 
actions. He means ill to no one, but he is very 
much below the business he has undertaken ; and 
if the sea runs high, he will be imable to hold the 
helm." And again, in writing to Washington: 
"Unluckily he has given in to measures . . . 
which he does not heartily approve, and he 
heartily approves many things which experience 
will demonstrate to be dangerous." 

The misshapen but mighty genius of Mirabeau 
he fotmd more difficulty in estimating; he prob- 
ably never rated it quite high enough. He natu- 
rally scorned a man of such degraded debauchery, 
who, having been one of the great inciters to 
revolution, had now become a subsidized ally of 
the court. He considered him "one of the most 
unprincipled scoimdrels that ever lived," although 



Life in Paris 209 

of "superior talents," and "so profligate that 
he would disgrace any administration," besides 
having so little principle as to make it unsafe to 
trust him. After his death he thus sums him up : 
"Vices both degrading and detestable marked this 
extraordinary being. Completely prostitute, he 
sacrificed everything to the whim of the moment ; 
— cupidiis alieni prodigns sui; venal, shameless; 
and yet greatly virtuous when pushed by a pre- 
vailing impulse, but never truly virtuous, because 
never under the steady control of reason, nor the 
firm authority of principle. I have seen this man, 
in the short space of two years, hissed, honored, 
hated, mourned. Enthusiasm has just now pre- 
sented him gigantic. Time and reflection will sink 
this stature." Even granting this to be wholly 
true, as it undoubtedly is in the main, it was never- 
theless the fact that in Mirabeau alone lay the last 
hope of salvation for the French nation; and 
Morris erred in strenuously opposing Lafayette's 
going into a ministry with him. Indeed, he seems 
in this case to have been blinded by prejudice, and 
certainly acted very inconsistently ; for his advice 
and the reasons he gave for it were completely at 
variance with the rules he himself laid down to 
Lafayette, with even more cynicism than common 
sense, when the latter once made some objections 
to certain proposed coadjutors of his : "I state to 
him . , . that, as to the objections he has made 
14 



2IO Gouverneur Morris 

on the score of morals in some, he must consider 
that men do not go into an administration as the 
direct road to heaven ; that they are prompted by 
ambition or avarice, and therefore that the only 
way to secure the most virtuous is by making it 
their interest to act rightly." 

Morris thus despised the king, and distrusted the 
chief political leaders ; and, as he wrote Washing- 
ton, he was soon convinced that there was an im- 
mense amount of corruption in the upper circles. 
The people at large he disliked even more than he 
did their advisers, and he had good grounds, too, 
as the following extract from his journal shows: 
"July 22, After dinner, walk a little tinder the 
arcade of the Palais Royal, waiting for my car- 
riage. In this period the head and body of M. 
de Toulon are introduced in triumph, the head on 
a pike, the body dragged naked on the earth. 
Afterward this horrible exhibition is carried 
through the different streets. His crime is, to 
have accepted a place in the ministry. This 
mutilated form of an old man of seventy-five is 
shown to his son-in-law, Berthier, the intendant 
of Paris; and afterward he also is put to death 
and cut to pieces, the populace carrying about the 
mangled fragments with a savage joy. Gracious 
God, what a people!" 

He describes at length, and most interestingly, 
the famous opening of the States General, "the 



Life in Paris 211 

beginning of the revolution." He eyed this body 
even at the beginning with great distrust ; and he 
never thought that any of the delegates showed 
especial capacity for grappling with the terrible 
dangers and difficulties by which they were en- 
compassed. He comments on the extreme enthu- 
siasm with which the king was greeted, and sym- 
pathizes strongly with ]\Iarie Antoinette, who was 
treated with studied and insulting coldness. ' ' She 
was exceedingly hurt. I cannot help feeling the 
mortification which the poor queen meets with, for 
I see only the woman ; and it seems immanly to 
treat a woman with unkindness. . . . Not one 
voice is heard to wish her well. I would certainly 
raise mine if I were a Frenchman ; but I have no 
right to express a sentiment, and in vain solicit 
those who are near me to do it." . . . At last "the 
queen rises, and, to my great satisfaction, she 
hears, for the first time in several months, the 
sound of ' Vive la reine! ' She makes a low cour- 
tesy, and this produces a louder acclamation, and 
that a lower courtesy." 

The sympathy was for the woman, not the 
queen, the narrow-minded, absolute sovereign, 
the intriguer against popular government, whose 
policy was as heavily fraught with bale for the 
nation as was that of Robespierre himself. The 
king was more than competent to act as his own 
evil genius; had he not been, Marie Antoinette 



I 



212 Gouverneur Morris 



» 



would have amply filled the place. He char- 
acterized the carrying of * ' that diabolical 
castle," the Bastille, as "among the most ex- 
traordinary things I have met with." The day it 
took place he wrote in his journal, with an irony 
very modem in its flavor: " Yesterday it was the 
fashion at Versailles not to believe that there were 
any disturbances at Paris. I presume that this 
day's transactions will induce a conviction that all 
is not perfectly quiet." 

He used the Bastille as a text when, shortly after- 
ward, he read a brief lesson to a certain eminent 
painter. The latter belonged to that class of artists 
with pen or pencil (only too plentiful in America 
at the present day) who always insist on devoting H 

their energies to depicting subjects worn thread- '4^' 

bare by thousands of predecessors, instead of work- 't'J 

ing in the new, broad fields, filled with picturesque 
material, opened to them by their own countr}^ and 
its history. ' ' The painter shows us a piece he is 
now about for the king, taken from the ^neid: 
Venus restraining the arm which is raised in the 
temple of the Vestals to shed the blood of Helen. 
I tell him he had better paint the storm of the 
Bastille." 



f 



CHAPTER IX. 

MISSION TO ENGLAND: RETURN TO PARIS. 

IN March, 1790, Morris went to London, in 
obedience to a letter received from Wash- 
ington appointing him private agent to the 
British government, and enclosing him the proper 
credentials. 

Certain of the conditions of the treaty of peace 
between Great Britain and the United States, al- 
though entered into seven years before, were still 
unfulfilled. It had been stipulated that the British 
should give up the fortified frontier posts within 
our territory, and should pay for the negroes they 
had taken away from the Southern States during 
the war. They had done neither, and Morris was 
charged to find out what the intentions of the gov- 
ernment were in the matter. He was also to find 
out whether there was a disposition to enter into 
a commercial treaty with the United States ; and 
finally, he was to sound them as to their sending a 
minister to America. 

On our part we had also failed to fulfill a por- 
tion of our treaty obligations, not having complied 
with the article w^hich provided for the payment of 
debts due before the war to British merchants. 
Both sides had been to blame; each, of course, 

313 



214 Gouverneur Morris 

blamed only the other. But now, when we were 
ready to perform our part, the British refused to 
perform theirs. 

As a consequence, Morris, although he spent 
most of the year in London, failed to accomplish 
anything. The feeling in England was hostile to 
America ; to the king, in particular, the very name 
was hateful. The English were still sore over their 
defeat, and hated us because we had been victors ; 
and yet they despised us also, for they thought we 
should be absolutely powerless except when we 
were acting merely on the defensive. From the 
days of the Revolution till the days of the Civil 
War, the ruling classes of England were bitterly 
antagonistic to our nation ; they always saw with 
glee any check to our national well-being; they 
wished us ill, and exulted in our misfortunes, while 
they sneered at our successes. The results have 
been lasting, and now work much more to their 
hurt than to ours. The past conduct of England 
certainly offers much excuse for, though it cannot 
in the least justify, the imreasonable and virulent 
anti-English feeling — that is, the feeling against 
Englishmen politically and nationally, not socially 
or individually — which is so strong in many parts 
of our country where the native American blood 
is purest. 

The English ministry in 1790 probably had the 
general feeling of the nation behind them in their 



Mission to England 215 

determination to injure us as much as they could ; 
at any rate, their aim seemed to be, as far as lay 
in them, to embitter our already existing hostility 
to their empire. They not only refused to grant 
us any substantial justice, but they were inclined 
to inflict on us and on our representatives those 
petty insults which rankle longer than injuries. 

When it came to this point, however, Morris was 
quite able to hold his own. He had a ready, biting 
tongue ; and, excepting Pitt and Fox, was intellec- 
tually superior to any of the public men whom he 
met. In social position, even as they understood 
it, he was their equal ; they could hardly look down 
on the brother of a British major-general, and a 
brother-in-law of the Duchess of Gordon. He was 
a man of rather fiery courage, and any attacks 
upon his country were not likely to be made twice 
in his presence. Besides, he never found the Eng- 
lish congenial as friends or companions ; he could 
not sympathize, or indeed get along well, with 
them. This distaste for their society he always 
retained, and though he afterward grew to respect 
them, and to be their warm partisan politically, 
he was at this time much more friendly to France, 
and was even helping the French ministers to con- 
coct a scheme of warfare against their neighbor. 
To his bright, impatient temperament, the English 
awkwardness seemed to be an insuperable ob- 
stacle to bringing people together "as in other 



21 6 Gouverneur Morris 

coiintries." He satirized the English drawing- 
rooms, "where the arrangement of the company 
was stiff and formal, the ladies all ranged in bat- 
talia on one side of the room ;" and remarked "that 
the French, having no liberty in their government, 
have compensated to themselves that misfortime 
by bestowing a great deal upon society. But that, 
I fear, in England, is all confined to the House of 
Commons." Years afterward he wrote to a friend 
abroad : ' ' Have you reflected that there is more 
of real society in one week at a continental 
watering-place] than in a London year ? Recollect 
that a tedious morning, a great dinner, a boozy 
afternoon, and dull evening make the sum total 
of English life. It is admirable for young men 
who shoot, himt, drink,— but for us ! How are we 
to dispose of ourselves? No. Were I to give you 
a rendezvous in Europe, it should be on the Con- 
tinent, I respect, as you know, the English nation 
highly, and love many individuals among them, 
but I do not love their manners." Times have 
changed, and the manners of the islanders with 
them. Exactly as the "rude Carinthian boor" 
has become the most polished of mortals, so, after 
a like transformation, English society is now per- 
haps the pleasantest and most interesting in 
Europe. Were Morris alive to-day, he would 
probably respect the English as much as he ever 
did, and like them a good deal more ; and, while he 



Mission to England 217 

might well have his preference for his own country 
confirmed, yet, if he had to go abroad, it is hard to 
believe that he would now pass by London in favor 
of any continental capital or watering-place. 

In acknowledging Washington's letter of ap- 
pointment, Morris wrote that he did not expect 
much difficulty, save from the king himself, who 
was very obstinate, and bore a personal dislike to 
his former subjects. But his interviews with the 
minister of foreign affairs, the Duke of Leeds, soon 
undeceived him. The duke met him with all the 
little tricks of delay and evasion known to old- 
fashioned diplomacy; tricks that are always 
greatly relished by men of moderate ability, and 
which are successful enough where the game is 
not very important, as in the present instance, 
but are nearly useless when the stakes are high 
and the adversary determined. The worthy 
nobleman was profuse in expressions of general 
good-will, and vague to a degree in his answers to 
every concrete question; affected to misunder- 
stand what was asked of him, and, when he could 
not do this, "slumbered profoimdly" for weeks 
before making his reply. Morris wrote that "his 
explanatory comments were more unintelligible 
than his texts," and was dehghted when he heard 
that he might be replaced by Lord Hawksbury; 
for the latter, although strongly anti-American, 
"would at least be an efficient minister," whereas 



2i8 Gouverneur Morris 

the former was "evidently afraid of committing 
himself by saying or doing anything positive." 
He soon concluded that Great Britain was so 
tmcertain as to how matters were going in Europe 
that she wished to keep us in a similar state 
of suspense. She had recovered with marvelous 
rapidity from the effects of the great war ; she was 
felt on all sides to hold a position of commanding 
power ; this she knew well, and so felt like driving 
a very hard bargain with any nation, especially 
with a weak one that she hated. It was particu- 
larly difficult to form a commercial treaty. There 
were very many Englishmen who agreed with a 
Mr. Irwin, "a mighty sour sort of creature," who 
assured Morris that he was utterly opposed to all 
American trade in grain, and that he wished to 
oblige the British people, by the force of starva- 
tion, to raise enough com for their own consump- 
tion. Fox told Morris that he and Burke were 
about the only two men left who believed that 
Americans should be allowed to trade in their own 
bottoms to the British islands; and he also in- 
formed him that Pitt was not hostile to America, 
but simply indifferent, being absorbed in Euro- 
pean matters, and allowing his colleagues free 
hands. 

Becoming impatient at the long-continued de- 
lay, Morris finally wrote, very courteously but 
very firmly, demanding some sort of answer, and 



Mission to England 219 

this produced a momentary activity, and assur- 
ances that he was under a misapprehension as to 
the delay, etc. The subject of the impressment 
of American sailors into British men-of-war, — a 
matter of chronic complaint throughout our first 
forty years of national life — now came up; and 
he remarked to the Duke of Leeds, with a pithy 
irony that should have made the saying famous: 
" I believe, my lord, that this is the only instance 
in which we are not treated as aliens." He pro- 
posed a plan which would have at least partially 
obviated the difficulties in the way of a settlement 
of the matter, but the duke would do nothing. 
Neither would he come to any agreement in refer- 
ence to the exchange of ministers between the 
two countries. 

Then came an interview with Pitt, and Morris, 
seeing how matters stood, now spoke out perfectly 
clearly. In answer to the accusations about our 
failure wholly to perform certain stipulations of 
the treaty, after reciting the counter accusations 
of the Americans, he brushed them all aside with 
the remark: " But, sir, what I have said tends to 
show that these complaints and inquiries are 
excellent if the parties mean to keep asunder; if 
they wish to come together, all such matters 
should be kept out of sight." He showed that 
the House of Representatives, in a friendly spirit, 
had recently decided against laying extraordinary 



220 



Gouverneur Morris 



restrictions on British vessels in our ports. "Mr. 
Pitt said that, instead of restrictions, we ought to 
give them particular privileges, in return for those 
we enjoy here. I assured him that I knew of 
none except that of being impressed, a privilege 
which of all others we least wished to partake 
of. . . . Mr. Pitt said seriously that they had 
certainly evinced good-will to us by what they 
had done respecting our commerce. I repHed 
therefore, with like seriousness, that their regu- 
lations had been dictated with a view to their 
own interests ; and therefore, as we felt no favor, 
we owed no obHgation." Morris reahzed thor- 
oughly that they were keeping matters in suspense 
because their behavior would depend upon the 
contingencies of war or peace with the neighboring 
powers; he wished to show that, if they acted 
thus, we would also bide our time till the moment 
came to strike a telling blow ; and accordingly he 
ended by telling Pitt, with straightforward direct- 
ness, a truth that was also a threat: "We do not 
think it worth while to go to war with you for 
the [frontier] forts ; but we know our rights, and 
will avail ourselves of them when time and circum- 
stances may suit." 

After this conversation he became convinced 
that we should wait until England herself felt the 
necessity of a treaty before trying to negotiate one. 
He wrote Washington "that those who, pursuing 



Mission to England 221 

the interests of Great Britain, wish to be on the 
best terms with America, are outnumbered by 
those whose sour prejudice and hot resentment 
render them averse to any intercourse except that 
which may immediately subserve a selfish policy. 
These men do not yet know America. Perhaps 
America does not yet know herself. . . . We are 
yet in but the seeding-time of national prosperity, 
and it will be well not to mortgage the crop before 
it is gathered. . . . England will not, I am per- 
suaded, enter into a treaty with us unless we give 
for it more than it is worth now, and infinitely 
more than it will be worth hereafter. A present 
bargain would be that of a young heir with an old 
usurer. , . . But, should war break out [with a 
European power], the anti-American party here 
will agree to any terms ; for it is more the taste of 
the medicine which they nauseate than the quan- 
tity of the dose." 

Accordingly all negotiations were broken off. 
In America his enemies blamed Morris for this 
failure. They asserted that his haughty manners 
and proud bearing had made him unpopular with 
the ministers, and that his consorting with mem- 
bers of the opposition had still further damaged 
his cause. The last assertion was wholly untrue ; 
for he had barely more than met Fox and his 
associates. But on a third point there was genuine 
reason for dissatisfaction. Morris had confided 



222 Gouverneur Morris 

his purpose to the French minister at London, 
M. de la Luzerne, doing so because he trusted to 
the latter' s honor, and did not wish to seem to 
take any steps imknown to our ally ; and he was 
in all probability also influenced by his constant 
association and intimacy with the French leaders, 
Luzerne, however, promptly used the information 
for his own purposes, letting the English ministers 
know that he was acquainted with Morris's ob- 
jects, and thus increasing the weight of France by 
making it appear that America acted only with 
her consent and advice. The affair curiously illus- 
trates Jay's wisdom eight years before, when he 
insisted on keeping Luzerne's superior at that 
time, Vergennes, in the dark as to our course 
during the peace negotiations. However, it is not 
at all likely that Mr. Pitt or the Duke of Leeds 
were influenced in their course by anything 
Luzerne said. 

Leaving London, Morris made a rapid trip 
through the Netherlands and up the Rhine. His 
journals, besides the usual comments on the inns, 
the bad roads, poor horses, sulky postilions, and 
the like, are filled with very interesting observa- 
tions on the character of the country through 
which he passed, its soil and inhabitants, and the 
indications they afforded of the national resources. 
He liked to associate with people of every kind, 
and he was intensely fond of natural scenery ; but, 



Return to Paris 223 

what seems rather surprising in a man of his cul- 
ture, he apparently cared very little for the great 
cathedrals, the picture galleries, and the works of 
art for which the old towns he visited were so 
famous. 

He reached Paris at the end of November, but 
was almost immediately called to London again, 
returning in January, 1791, and making three or 
four similar trips in the course of the year. His 
own business affairs took up a great deal of his 
time. He was engaged in very many different 
operations, out of which he made a great deal of 
money, being a shrewd business man with a strong 
dash of the speculator. He had to prosecute a suit 
against the farmers-general of France for a large 
quantity of tobacco shipped them by contract ; and 
he gives a very amusing description of the visits he 
made to the judges before whom the case was to be 
tried. Their occupations were certainly various, 
being those of a farrier, a goldsmith, a grocer, a 
currier, a woolen draper, and a bookseller respec- 
tively. As a sample of his efforts, take the follow- 
ing: "Return home and dine. At five resume 
my visits to my judges, and first wait upon 
the honorable M. Gillet, the grocer, who is in a 
little cuddy adjoining his shop, at cards. He 
assures me that the courts are impartial, and alike 
uninfluenced by farmers, receivers, and grand 
seigneurs; that they are generally of the same 



224 Gouverneur Morris 

opinion ; that he will do everything in his power ; 
and the like. De V autre cote, perfect confidence in 
the ability and integrity of the court. Wish only 
to bring the cause to such a point as that I may 
have the honor to present a memorial. Am vastly 
sorry to have been guilty of an intrusion upon the 
amusements of his leisure hours. Hope he will 
excuse the solicitude of a stranger, and patronize 
a claim of such evident justice. The whole goes 
off very well, though I with difficulty restrain my 
risible faculties. ... A disagreeable scene, the 
ridicule of which is so strongly painted to my own 
eyes that I cannot forbear laughing." 

He also contracted to deliver Necker twenty 
thousand barrels of flour for the relief of Paris; 
wherein, by the way, he lost heavily. He took part 
in simdry shipping operations. Perhaps the most 
lucrative business in which he was engaged was in 
negotiating the sale of wild lands in America. He 
even made many efforts to buy the Virginian and 
Pennsylvanian domains of the Fairfaxes and the 
Penns. On behalf of a syndicate, he endeavored 
to purchase the American debts to France and 
Spain ; these being purely speculative efforts, as it 
was supposed that the debts could be obtained at 
quite a low figure, while, under the new Constitu- 
tion, the United States would certainly soon make 
arrangements for paying them off. These various 
operations entailed a wonderful amount of down- 



Return to Paris 225 

right hard work; yet all the while he remained 
not only a close observer of French politics, but 
to a certain extent, even an actor in them. 

He called upon Lafayette as soon as he was 
again established in Paris, after his mission to 
London. He saw that affairs had advanced to 
such a pitch in France that "it was no longer a 
question of liberty, but simply who shall be mas- 
ter." He had no patience with those who wished 
the king to place himself, as they phrased it, at 
the head of the revolution, remarking: "The 
trade of a revolutionist appears to me a hard one 
for a prince." "What with the folly of one side 
and the madness of the other, things were going 
to pieces very rapidly. At one of his old haimts, 
the club, the " sentiment aristocratique " had made 
great headway: one of his friends, De Moustin, 
now in favor with the king and queen, was "as 
usual on the high ropes of royal prerogative." 
Lafayette, however, was still wedded to his theo- 
ries, and did not appear over-glad to see his Ameri- 
can friend, all whose ideas and habits of thought 
were so opposed to his own; while madame was 
still cooler in her reception. Morris, nothing 
daunted, talked to his friend very frankly and 
seriously. He told him that the time had come 
when all good citizens would be obliged, simply 
from lack of choice, to cling to the throne; that 
the executive must be strengthened, and good and 
15 



226 Gouverneur Morris 

able men put into the council. He pronounced 
the "thing called a constitution" good for noth- 
ing, and showed that the National Assembly 
was rapidly falling into contempt. He pointed 
out, for the hundredth time, that each country 
needed to have its own form of government ; that 
an American constitution would not do for France, 
for the latter required an even higher-toned system 
than that of England ; and that, above all things, 
France needed stability. He gave the reasons for 
his advice clearly and forcibly ; but poor Lafayette 
flinched from it, and could not be persuaded to 
take any effectual step. 

It is impossible to read Morris's shrewd com- 
ments on the events of the day, and his plans in 
reference to them, without wondering that France 
herself should at the crisis have failed to produce 
any statesmen to be compared with him for force, 
insight, and readiness to do what was practically 
best under the circumstances ; but her past history 
for generations had been such as to make it out of 
the question for her to bring forth such men as 
the foimders of our own government. Warriors, 
lawgivers, and diplomats she had in abundance. 
Statesmen who would be both hard-headed and 
true-hearted, who would be wise and yet imselfish, 
who would enact laws for a free people that would 
make that people freer still, and yet hinder them 
from doing wrong to their neighbors, — statesmen 



Return to Paris 227 

of this order she neither had nor could have had. 
Indeed, had there been such, it may well be 
doubted if they could have served France. With 
a people who made up in fickle ferocity what they 
lacked in self-restraint, and a king too timid and 
short-sighted to turn any crisis to advantage, the 
French statesmen, even had thev been as wise as 
they were foolish, would hardly have been able to 
arrest or alter the march of events. Morris said 
bitterly that France was the country where every- 
thing was talked of, and where hardly anything 
was imderstood. 

He told Lafayette that he thought the only hope 
of the kingdom lay in a foreign war ; it is possible 
that the idea may have been suggested to him by 
Lafayette's naive remark that he believed his 
troops would readily follow him into action, but 
that they would not mount guard when it rained. 
Morris not only constantly urged the French min- 
isters to make war, but actually drew up a plan 
of campaign for them. He believed it would 
turn the popular ardor, now constantly inflamed 
against the aristocrats, into a new channel, and 
that ' ' there was no word perhaps in the dictionary 
which would take the place of aristocrat so readily 
as Anglais.'" In proof of the wisdom, of his propo- 
sitions he stated, with absolute truthfulness: "If 
Britain had declared war in 1 774 against the house 
of Bourbon, the now United States would have 



228 Gouverneur Morris 

bled freely in her cause." He was disgusted with 
the littleness of the men who, appalled at their own 
surroundings, and unable to make shift even for 
the moment, found themselves thrown by chance 
to the helm, and face to face with the wildest 
storm that had ever shaken a civilized govern- 
ment. Speaking of one of the new ministers, he 
remarked: "They say he is a good kind of man, 
which is saying very little;" and again, "You 
want just now great men, to pursue great meas- 
ures." Another time, in advising a war, — a war 
of men, not of money, — and speaking of the efforts 
made by the neighboring powers against the revo- 
lutionists in Flanders, he told his French friends 
that they must either suffer for or with their allies ; 
and that the latter was at once the noblest and 
the safest course. 

In a letter to Washington he drew a picture of 
the chaos as it really was, and at the same time, 
with wonderful clear-sightedness, showed the great 
good which the change was eventually to bring to 
the mass of the people. Remembering how bitter 
Morris's feelings were against the revolutionists, it 
is extraordinary that they did not blind him to the 
good that would in the long run result from their 
movement. Not another statesman would have 
been able to set forth so clearly and temperately 
the benefits that would finally come from the con- 
vulsions he saw around him, although he rightly 



Return to Paris 229 

believed that these benefits would be even greater 
could the hideous excesses of the revolutionists be 
forthwith stopped and punished. 

His letter runs: "This unhappy country, bewil- 
dered in the pursuit of metaphysical whimsies, 
presents to our moral view a mighty ruin. . . . 
The sovereign, humbled to the level of a beggar 
without pity, without resources, without authority, 
without a friend. The Assembly, at once a master 
and a slave, new in power, wild in theory, raw in 
practice. It engrosses all functions, though in- 
capable of exercising any, and has taken from this 
fierce, ferocious people every restraint of religion 
and of respect." Where this would all end, or 
what sum of misery would be necessary to change 
the popular will and awaken the popular heart, he 
could not say. A glorious opportimity had been 
lost, and for the time being the revolution had 
failed. Yet, he went on to say, in the conse- 
quences flowing from it he was confident he could 
see the foundation of future prosperity. For 
among these consequences were: — (i) the aboli- 
tion of the different rights and privileges which 
had formerly kept the various provinces asunder ; 
(2) the abolition of feudal tyranny, by which the 
tenure of real property would be simplified, and 
the rent no longer be dependent upon idle vanity, 
capricious taste, or sullen pride; (3) the throwing 
into the circle of industry those vast possessions 



230 Gouverneur Morris 

formerly held by the clergy in mortmain, wealth 
conferred upon them as wages for their idleness, 
(4) the destruction of the system of venal juris- 
prudence which had established the pride and 
privileges of the few on the misery and degrada- 
tion of the general mass; (5) above all, the estab- 
lishment of the principles of true liberty, which 
would remain as solid facts after the superstruc- 
ture of metaphysical froth and vapor should have 
been blown away. Finally, "from the chaos of 
opinion and the conflict of its jarring elements a 
new order will at length arise, which, though in 
some degree the child of chance, may not be less 
productive of human happiness than the fore- 
thought provisions of human speculation." Not 
one other contemporary statesman could have 
begun to give so just an estimate of the good the 
revolution would accomplish ; no other could have 
seen so deeply into its ultimate results, while also 
keenly conscious of the dreadful evil through 
which these results were being worked out. 

The social life of Paris still went on, though 
with ever less of gayety, as the gloom gathered 
round about. Going with Madame de Chastellux 
to dine with the Duchess of Orleans, Morris was 
told by her royal highness that she was " ruined," 
that is, that her income was reduced from four 
hundred and fifty thousand to two hundred thou- 
sand livres a year, so that she could no longer give 



Return to Paris 231 

him good dinners ; but if he would come and fast 
with her, she would be glad to see him. The poor 
lady was yet to learn by bitter experience that real 
ruin was something very different from the loss of 
half of an enormous income. 

On another occasion he breakfasted with the 
duchess, and was introduced to her father, with 
whom he agreed to dine. After breakfast she 
went out walking with him till nearly dinner-time, 
and gave him the full history of her breach with 
her husband, Egalite, showing the letters that had 
passed between them, complaining of his nume- 
rous misdeeds, and assuring Morris that what the 
world had attributed to fondness for her worthless 
spouse was merely discretion ; that she had hoped 
to bring him to a decent and orderly behavior, 
but had finally made up her mind that he could 
only be governed by fear. 

Now and then he indulges in a quiet laugh at 
the absurd pretensions and exaggerated estimates 
of each other still affected by some of the frequent- 
ers of the various salons. "Dine with Madame 
de Stael. The Abbe Sieyes is here, and descants 
with much self-sufficiency on government, despis- 
ing all that has been said or simg on that subject 
before him; and madame says that his writings 
and opinions will form in politics a new era, like 
those of Newton in phyvSics." 

After dming with Marmontel, he notes in his 



232 Gouverneur Morris 

diary that his host "thinks soundly," — rare praise 
for him to bestow on any of the French statesmen 
of the time. He records a bon mot of Talleyrand's. 
When the Assembly had declared war on the 
emperor conditionally upon the latter's failing to 
beg pardon before a certain date, the little bishop 
remarked that "the nation was une parvenue, and 
of course insolent." At the British ambassador's 
he met the famous Colonel Tarleton, who did not 
know his nationality, and amused him greatly by 
descanting at length on the American war. 

He was very fond of the theater, especially of 
the Comedie Fran^aise, where Preville, whom he 
greatly admired, was acting in Moliere's "Am- 
phitryon." Many of the plays, whose plots pre- 
sented in any way analogies to what was actually 
happening in the political world, raised great 
excitement among the spectators. Going to see 
"Brutus" acted, he records that the noise and 
altercations were tremendous, but that finally the 
democrats in the parterre got the upper hand by 
sheer lusty roaring, which they kept up for a quar- 
ter of an hour at a time, and, at the conclusion of 
the piece, insisted upon the bust of Voltaire being 
crowned and placed on the stage. Soon afterward 
a tragedy called "Charles Neuf," founded on the 
massacre of St, Bartholomew, was put on the 
stage, to help the Assembly in their crusade 
against the clergy; he deemed it a very extraor- 



Return to Paris 233 

dinary piece to be represented in a Catholic coun- 
try, and thought that it would give a fatal blow 
to the Catholic religion. 

The priesthood, high and low, he disliked more 
than any other set of men; all his comments on 
them show his contempt. The high prelates he 
especially objected to. The Bishop of Orleans he 
considered to be a luxurious old gentleman, "of 
the kind whose sincerest prayer is for the fruit of 
good living, one who evidently thought it more 
important to speak than to speak the truths The 
leader of the great church dignitaries, in their fight 
for their rich benefices, was the Abbe Maury, who, 
Morris writes, "is a man who looks like a down- 
right ecclesiastical scoundrel." He met him in 
Madame de Nadaillac's salon, where were "a party 
of fierce aristocrats. They have the word 'valet' 
written on their foreheads in large characters. 
Maury is formed to govern such men, and they 
are formed to obey him or any one else. But 
j\Iaury seems to have too much vanity for a great 
man." To tell the bare truth is sometimes to make 
the most venomous comment possible, and this he 
evidently felt when he wrote of his meeting with 
the Cardinal de Rohan: "We talk among other 
things about religion, for the cardinal is very 
devout. He was once the lover of Madame de 
Flahaut's sister." 

But as the tremendous changes went on about 



234 Gouverneur Morris 

him, Morris had continually less and less time to 
spend in mere social pleasures ; graver and weight- 
ier matters called for his attention, and his diary 
deals with the shifts and stratagems of the French 
politicians, and pays little heed to the sayings and 
manners of nobles, bishops, and ladies of rank. 

The talented, self-confident, fearless American, 
admittedly out of sympathy with what he called 
" this abominable populace," was now well known ; 
and in their terrible tangle of dangers and perplex- 
ities, court and ministry alike turned to him for 
help. Perhaps there has hardly been another 
instance where, in such a crisis, the rulers have 
clutched in their despair at the advice of a mere 
private stranger sojourning in the land on his own 
business. The king and his ministers, as well as 
the queen, kept in constant commimication with 
him. With Montmorin he dined continually, and 
was consulted at every stage. But he could not 
prevail on them to adopt the bold, vigorous mea- 
sures he deemed necessary; his plain speaking 
startled them, and they feared it would not suit 
the temper of the people. He drafted numerous 
papers for them, among others a royal speech, 
which the king liked, but which his ministers pre- 
vented him from using. In fact, it had grown to 
be hopeless to try to help the court ; for the latter 
pursued each course by fits and starts, now gov- 
erned by advice from Coblentz, now by advice 



Return to Paris 235 

from Brussels, and then for a brief spasm going 
its own gait. All the while the people at large 
knew their own minds no better than poor Louis 
knew his, and cheered him with fervent ecstasy- 
one day, only to howl at him with malignant fury 
the next. With such a monarch and such subjects 
it is not probable that any plan would have worked 
well; but Morris's was the ablest as well as the 
boldest and best defined of the many that were 
offered to the wretched, halting king ; and had his 
proposed policy been pursued, things might have 
come out better, and they could not possibly have 
come out worse. 

All through these engrossing affairs he kept up 
the liveliest interest in what was going on in his 
own coimtry, writing home shrewd observations on 
every step taken. One of his remarks deserves to 
be kept in mind. In speaking of the desire of 
European nations to legislate against the introduc- 
tion of our produce, he says that this effort has 
after all its bright side; because it will force us 
"to make great and rapid progress in useful manu- 
factures. This alone is wanting to complete our 
independence. We shall then be, as it were, a 
world by ourselves." 



CHAPTER X. 

MINISTER TO FRANCE. 

IN the Spring of 1792, Morris received his cre- 
dentials as minister to France. There had 
been determined opposition in the Senate to 
the confirmation of his appointment, which was 
finally carried only by a vote of sixteen to eleven, 
mainly through the exertions of Rufus King. 
His opponents urged the failure of the British 
negotiations, the evidences repeatedly given of 
his proud, impatient spirit, and above all his 
hostility to the French Revolution, as reasons why 
he should not be made minister. Washington, 
however, as well as Hamilton, King, and the other 
Federalists, shared most of Morris's views with 
regard to the revolution, and insisted upon his 
appointment. 

But the President, as good and wise a friend as 
Morris had, thought it best to send him a word of 
warning, coupling with the statement of his own 
unfaltering trust and regard the reasons why the 
new diplomat should observe more circumspection 
than his enemies thought him capable of showing. 
For his opponents asserted that his brilliant, 
lively imagination always inclined him to act so 
promptly as to leave no time for cool judgment, 

236 



Minister to France 237 

and was, wrote Washington, "the primary cause 
of those sallies which too often offend, and of that 
ridicule of character which begets enmity not easy 
to be forgotten, but which might easily be avoided 
if it were under the control of caution and pru- 
dence. . . . By reciting their objections] I give 
you a proof of my friendship, if I give none of my 
policy." 

Morris took his friend's advice in good part, and 
profited by it as far as lay in his nature. He knew 
that he had a task of stupendous difficulty before 
him ; as it would be almost impossible for a minis- 
ter to steer clear of the quarrels springing from the 
ferocious hatred borne to each other by the royal- 
ists and the various republican factions. To stand 
well with all parties he knew was impossible: but 
he thought it possible, and merel}^ so, to stand well 
with the best people in each, without greatly 
offending the others; and, in order to do this, 
he had to make up his mind to mingle with the 
worst as well as the best, to listen unmoved to 
falsehoods so foul and calumnies so senseless as 
to seem the ravings of insanity; and meanwhile 
to wear a front so firm and yet so courteous as to 
ward off insult from his country and injury from 
himself during the days when the whole people 
went crazy with the blood-lust, when his friends 
were butchered by scores around him, and when 
the rulers had fulfilled Mirabeau's terrible proph- 



238 Gouverneur Morris 

ecy, and had " paved the streets with their bodies." 
But when he began his duties, he was already 
entangled in a most dangerous intrigue, one of 
whose very existence he should not, as a foreign 
minister, have known, still less have entered into. 
He got enmeshed in it while still a private citizen, 
and could not honorably withdraw, for it dealt 
with nothing less than the escape of the king and 
queen from Paris. His chivalrous sympathy for 
the two hemmed-in, hunted creatures, threatened 
by madmen and counseled by fools, joined with 
his characteristic impulsiveness and fearlessness to 
incline him to make an effort to save them from 
their impending doom. A number of plans had 
been made to get the king out of Paris ; and as the 
managers of each were of necessity ignorant of all 
the rest, they clashed with and thwarted one 
another. ]\Iorris's scheme was made in concert 
with a M. de Monciel, one of the royal ministers, 
and some other French gentlemen; and their 
measures were so well taken that they would 
doubtless have succeeded had not the king's nerve 
invariably failed him at the critical moment, and 
brought delay after delay. The Swiss guards, 
faithful to their salt, were always ready to cover 
his flight, and Lafayette would have helped them. 
Louis preferred Morris's plan to any of the 
others offered, and gave a most striking proof of 
his preference by sending to the latter, toward the 



<i 



Minister to France 239 

end of July, to say how much he regretted that his 
advice had not been followed, and to ask him if he 
would not take charge of the royal papers and 
money. Morris was unwilling to take the papers, 
but finaliy consented to receive the money, 
amounting in all to nearly seven hundred and 
fifty thousand livres, which was to be paid out 
in hiring and bribing the men who stood in the 
way of the escape ; for most of the revolutionists 
were as venal as they were bloodthirsty. Still the 
king lingered; then came the loth of August; 
the Swiss guards were slaughtered, and the whole 
scheme was at an end. Some of the men engaged 
in the plot were suspected; one, D'Angremont, 
was seized and condemned, but he went to his 
death without betraying his fellows. The others, 
by the liberal use of the money in Morris's posses- 
sion, were saved, the authorities being bribed to 
wink at their escape or concealment. Out of the 
money that was left advances were made to Mon- 
ciel and others; finally, in 1796, Morris gave an 
accurate accoimt of the expenditures to the dead 
king's daughter, the Duchesse d'Angouleme, then 
at the Austrian court, and turned over to her the 
remainder, consisting of a hundred and forty-seven 
pounds. 

Of course all this was work in which no minister 
had the least right to share ; but the whole crisis 
was one so completely without precedent that it is 



240 



Gouverneur Morris 



impossible to blame Morris for what he did. The 
extraordinary trust reposed in him, and the feeling 
that his own exertions were all that lay between 
the two imfortunate sovereigns and their fate 
roused his gallantry and blinded him to the risk 
he himself ran, as well as to the hazard to which 
he put his coimtry's interests. He was imder no 
illusion as to the character of the people whom he 
was trying to serve. He utterly disapproved the 
queen's conduct, and he despised the king, noting 
the latter's feebleness and embarrassment, even 
on the occasion of his presentation at court; he 
saw in them ' ' a lack of mettle which would ever 
prevent them from being truly royal;" but when 
in their mortal agony they held out their hands to 
him for aid, his generous nature forbade him to 
refuse it, nor could he look on immoved as they 
went helplessly down to destruction. 

The rest of his two years' history as minister 
forms one of the most brilliant chapters in our 
diplomatic annals. His boldness and the frank- 
ness with which he expressed his opinions, though 
they at times irritated beyond measure the fac- 
tions of the revolutionists who successively 
grasped a brief but tremendous power, yet awed 
them, in spite of themselves. He soon learned to 
combine courage and caution, and his readiness, 
wit, and dash always gave him a certain hold over 
the fiery nation to which he was accredited. He 



Minister to France 241 

was firm and dignified in insisting on proper 
respect being shown our flag, while he did all he 
could to hasten the payment of our obligations to 
France. A very large share of his time, also, was 
taken up with protesting against the French 
decrees aimed at neutral — which meant Amer- 
ican — commerce, and with interfering to save 
American shipmasters, who had got into trouble 
by unwittingly violating them. Like his suc- 
cessor, Mr. Washbume, in the time of the com- 
mune, Morris was the only foreign minister who 
remained in Paris during the terror. He stayed 
at the risk of his life ; and yet, while fully aware 
of his danger, he carried himself as coolly as if in 
a time of profound peace, and never flinched for a 
moment when he was obliged for his coimtry's 
sake to call to account the rulers of France for the 
time being, — men whose power was as absolute 
as it was ephemeral and bloody, who had indulged 
their desire for slaughter with the unchecked 
ferocity of madmen, and who could by a word 
have had him slain as thousands had been slain 
before him Few foreign ministers have faced 
such difficulties, and not one has ever come near 
to facing such dangers as Morris did during his 
two years' term of service. His feat stands by 
itself in diplomatic history; and, as a minor inci- 
dent, the letters and despatches he sent home give 
a very striking view of the French Revolution. 
16 



242 Gouverneur Morris 

As soon as he was appointed he went to see the 
French minister of foreign affairs ; and, in answer 
to an observation of the latter, stated with his cus- 
tomary straightforwardness that it was true that, 
while a mere private individual, sincerely friendly 
to France, and desirous of helping her, and whose 
own nation could not be compromised by his acts, 
he had freely taken part in passing events, had 
criticized the Constitution, and advised the king 
and his ministers ; but he added that, now that he 
was a public man, he would no longer meddle with 
their affairs. To this resolution he kept, save that, 
as already described, sheer humanity induced him 
to make an effort to save the king's life. He had 
predicted what would ensue as the result of the 
exaggerated decentralization into which the oppo- 
nents of absolutism had rushed; when they had 
split the state up into more than forty thousand 
sovereignties, each district the sole executor of the 
law, and the only judge of its propriety, and there- 
fore obedient to it only so long as it listed, and 
imtil rendered hostile by the ignorant whim or 
ferocious impulse of the moment ; and now he was 
to see his predictions come true. In that brilliant 
and able state paper, the address he had drawn 
up for Louis to deliver when in 1791 the latter 
accepted the Constitution, the keynote of the situ- 
ation was struck in the opening words: "It is no 
longer a king who addresses you, Louis XVI. is a 



Minister to France 243 

private individual;" and he had then scored off, 
point by point, the faults in a document that cre- 
ated an unwieldy assembly of men unaccustomed 
to govern, that destroyed the principle of author- 
ity, though no other could appeal to a people 
helpless in their new-bom liberty, and that created 
out of one whole a jarring multitude of fractional 
sovereignties. Now he was to see one of these 
same sovereignties rise up in successful rebellion 
against the government that represented the 
whole, destroy it and usurp its power, and estab- 
lish over all France the rule of an anarchic despot- 
ism which, by what seems to a free American a 
gross misnomer, they called a democracy. 

All through June, at the beginning of which 
month Morris had been formally presented at 
court, the excitement and tumult kept increasing 
When, on the 20th, the mob forced the gates of 
the chateau, and made the king put on the red cap, 
Morris wrote in his diary that the Constitution 
had given its last groan. A few days afterward 
he told Lafayette that in six weeks everything 
would be over, and tried to persuade him that his 
only chance was to make up his mind instantly to 
fight either for a good constitution or for the 
wretched piece of paper which bore the name. 
Just six weeks to a day from the date of this pre- 
diction came the loth of August to verify it. 

Throughout July the fevered pulses of the people 



244 Gouverneur Morris 

beat with always greater heat. Looking at the 
maddened mob, the American minister thanked 
God from his heart that in his own country there 
was no such populace, and prayed with unwonted 
earnestness that our education and morality should 
forever stave off such an evil. At court even the 
most purblind dimly saw their doom. Calling 
there one morning, he chronicles with a matter of 
fact brevity, impressive from its very baldness, 
that nothing of note had occurred except that 
they had stayed up all night expecting to be mur- 
dered. He wrote home that he could not tell 
"whether the king would live through the storm; 
for it blew hard." 

His horror of the base mob, composed of people 
whose kind was absolutely imknown in America, 
increased continually, as he saw them going on 
from crimes that were great to crimes that were 
greatter, incited by the demagogues who flattered 
them and roused their passions and appetites, and 
blindly raging because they were of necessity dis- 
appointed in the golden prospects held out to 
them. He scorned the folly of the enthusiasts and 
doctrinaires who had made a constitution all sail 
and no ballast, that overset at the first gust ; who 
had freed from all restraint a mass of men as sav- 
age and licentious as they were wayward ; who had 
put the executive in the power of the legislature, 
and this latter at the mercy of the leaders who 



Minister to France 245 

could most strongly influence and inflame the mob. 
But his contempt for the victims almost exceeded 
his anger at their assailants. The king, who could 
suffer with firmness, and who could act either not 
at all, or else with the worst possible effect, had 
the head and heart that might have suited the 
monkish idea of a female saint, but which were 
hopelessly out of place in any rational being sup- 
posed to be fitted for doing good in the world. 
Morris wrote home that he knew his friend Hamil- 
ton had no particular aversion to kings, and would 
not beHeve them to be tigers, but that if Hamil- 
ton came to Europe to see for himself, he would 
surely believe them to be monkeys ; the Empress 
of Russia was the only reigning sovereign whose 
talents were not "considerably below par." At 
the moment of the final shock, the court was in- 
volved in a set of paltry intrigues "unworthy of 
anything above the rank of a footman or a cham- 
bermaid. Every one had his or her little project, 
and every little project had some abettors. Strong, 
manly coimsels frightened the weak, alarmed the 
envious, and wounded the enervated minds of the 
lazy and luxurious." The few such counsels that 
appeared were always approved, rarely adopted, 
and never followed out. 

Then, in the sweltering heat of August, the end 
came. A raving, furious horde stormed the cha- 
teau, and murdered, one by one, the brave moun- 



246 Gouverneur Morris 

taineers who gave their Hves for a sovereign too 
weak to be worthy of such gallant bloodshed. 
King and queen fled to the National Assembly, 
and the monarchy was over. Immediately after 
the awful catastrophe Morris wrote to a friend: 
" The voracity of the court, the haughtiness of the 
nobles, the sensuality of the church, have met 
their punishment in the road of their transgres- 
sions. The oppressor has been squeezed by the 
hands of the oppressed ; but there remains yet to 
be acted an awful scene in this great tragedy, 
played on the theater of the universe for the 
instruction of mankind." 

Not the less did he dare everything, and jeop- 
ardize his own life in trying to save some at least 
among the innocent who had been overthrown in 
the crash of the common ruin. When on the loth 
of August the whole city lay abject at the mercy 
of the mob, hunted men and women, bereft of all 
they had, and fleeing from a terrible death, with 
no hiding-place, no friend who could shield them, 
turned in their terror-struck despair to the one 
man in whose fearlessness and generous gallantry 
they could trust. The shelter of Morris's house 
and flag was sought from early morning till past 
midnight by people who had nowhere else to go, 
and who felt that within his walls they were sure 
of at least a brief safety from the maddened sav- 
ages in the streets. As far as possible they were 



Minister to France 247 

sent off to places of greater security; but some 
had to stay with him till the storm lulled for a 
moment. An American gentleman who was in 
Paris on that memorable day, after viewing the 
sack of the Tuileries, thought it right to go to the 
house of the American minister. He found him 
surrounded by a score of people, of both sexes, 
among them the old Coimt d'Estaing, and other 
men of note, who had fought side by side with us 
in our war for independence, and whom now our 
flag protected in their hour of direst need. Silence 
reigned, only broken occasionally by the weeping 
of the women and children. As his visitor was 
leaving, Morris took him to one side, and told him 
that he had no doubt there were persons on the 
watch who would find fault with his conduct as a 
minister in receiving and protecting these people ; 
that they had come of their own accord, iminvited. 
' ' Whether my house will be a protection to them 
or to me, God only knows; but I will not turn 
them out of it, let what will happen to me; you 
see, sir, they are all persons to whom our country 
is more or less indebted, and, had they no such 
claim upon me, it would be inhuman to force them 
into the hands of the assassins." No one of 
Morris's countrymen can read his words even now 
without feeling a throb of pride in the dead states- 
man who, a century ago, held up so high the 
honor of his nation's name in the times when the 



248 Gouverneur Morris 

souls of all but the very bravest were tried and 
found wanting. 

Soon after this he ceased writing in his diary, 
for fear it might fall into the hands of men who 
would use it to incriminate his friends; and for 
the same reason he had also to be rather wary in 
what he wrote home, as his letters frequently bore 
marks of being opened, thanks to what he laugh- 
ingly called "patriotic curiosity." He was, how- 
ever, perfectly fearless as regards any ill that 
might befall himself ; his circumspection was only 
exercised on behalf of others, and his own opinions 
were given as frankly as ever. 

He pictured the French as huddled together, in 
an imreasoning panic, like cattle before a thtmder- 
storm. Their every act increased his distrust of 
their capacity for self-government. They were for 
the time agog with their repubhc, and ready to 
adopt any form of government with a huzza ; but 
that they would adopt a good form, or, having 
adopted it, keep it, he did not beheve ; and he saw 
that the great mass of the population were already 
veering round, imder the pressure of accumulating 
horrors, until they would soon be ready to welcome 
as a blessing even a despotism, if so they could 
gain security to life and property. They had 
made the common mistake of beheving that to 
enjoy liberty they had only to aboHsh authority; 
and the equally common consequence was that 



Minister to France 249 

they were now, through anarchy, on the high road 
to absolutism. Said Morris: "Since I have been 
in this country I have seen the worship of many 
idols, and but little of the true God. I have seen 
many of these idols broken, and some of them 
beaten to the dust. I have seen the late constitu- 
tion in one short year admired as a stupendous 
monument of human wisdom, and ridiculed as an 
egregious production of folly and vice. I wish 
much, very much, the happiness of this inconstant 
people. I love them, I feel grateful for their 
efforts in our cause, and I consider the establish- 
ment of a good constitution here as the principal 
means, under Divine Providence, of extending the 
blessings of freedom to the many millions of my 
fellow men who groan in bondage on the continent 
of Europe. But I do not greatly indulge the 
flattering illusions of hope, because I do not yet 
perceive that reformation of morals without which 
liberty is but an empty soimd." These words are 
such as could only come from a genuine friend of 
France, and champion of freedom ; from a strong, 
earnest man, saddened by the folHes of dreamers, 
and roused to stem anger by the licentious wicked- 
ness of scoundrels who used the name of liberty to 
cloak the worst abuses of its substance. 

His stay in Paris was now melancholy indeed. 
The city was shrouded in a gloom only relieved by 
the frenzied tumults that grew steadily more 



250 Gouverneur Morris 

numerous. The ferocious craving once roused 
could not be sated ; the thirst grew ever stronger 
as the draughts were deeper. The danger to Mor- 
ris's own person merely quickened his pulses, and 
roused his strong, brave nature; he liked excite- 
ment, and the strain that would have been too 
tense for weaker nerves keyed his own up to a 
fierce, half-exultant thrilling. But the woes that 
befell those who had befriended him caused him 
the keenest grief. It was almost imbearable to 
be seated quietly at dinner, and hear by accident 
" that a friend was on his way to the place of exe- 
cution," and to have to sit still and wonder which 
of the guests dining with him would be the next to 
go to the scaffold. The vilest criminals swarmed 
in the streets, and amused themselves by tearing 
the earrings from women's ears, and snatching 
away their watches. When the priests shut up in 
the carnes and the prisoners in the abbaye were 
murdered, the slaughter went on all day, and eight 
himdred men were engaged in it. 

He wrote home that, to give a true picture of 
France, he would have to paint it like an Indian 
warrior, black and red. The scenes that passed 
were literally beyond the imagination of the 
American mind. The most hideous and nameless 
atrocities were so common as to be only alluded to 
incidentally, and to be recited in the most matter- 
of-fact way in connection with other events. For 



Minister to France 251 

instance, a man applied to the Convention for a 
recompense for damage done to his quarry, a pit 
dug deep through the surface of the earth into the 
stone bed beneath : the damage consisted in such 
a number of dead bodies having been thrown into 
the pit as to choke it up so that he could no longer 
get men to work it. Hundreds, who had been the 
first in the land, were thus destroyed without form 
or trial, and their bodies thrown like dead dogs 
into the first hole that offered. Two hundred 
priests were killed for no other crime than having 
been conscientiously scrupulous about taking the 
prescribed oath. The guillotine went smartly on, 
watched with a devilish merriment by the fiends 
who were themselves to perish by the instrument 
their own hands had wrought. "Heaven only 
knew who was next to drink of the dreadful cup ; 
as far as man could tell, there was to be no lack of 
liquor for some time to come." 

Among the new men who, one after another, 
sprang into the light, to maintain their unsteady 
footing as leaders for but a brief time before top- 
pling into the dark abyss of death or oblivion that 
waited for each and all, Dumouriez was for the 
moment the most prominent. He stood toward 
the Gironde much as Lafayette had stood toward 
the Constitutionalists of 1789 ; he led the army, as 
Lafayette once had led it ; and as the constitutional 
monarchists had fallen before his fellow republi- 



252 Gouverneur Morris 

cans, so both he and they were to go down before 
the even wilder extremists of the "Mountain." 
For the factions in Paris, face to face with the 
banded might of the European monarchies, and 
grappling in a grim death - struggle with the 
counter-revolutionists of the provinces, yet fought 
one another with the same ferocity they showed 
toward the common foe. Nevertheless, success 
was theirs ; for against opponents only less wicked 
than themselves they moved with an infinitely 
superior fire and enthusiasm. Reeking with the 
blood of the guiltless, steeped in it to the lips, 
branded with fresh memories of crimes and in- 
famies without number, and yet feeling in their 
very marrow that they were avenging centuries of 
grinding and intolerable thraldom, and that the 
cause for which they fought was just and right- 
eous ; with shameless cruelty and corruption eat- 
ing into their hearts' core, yet with their foreheads 
kindled by the light of a glorious morning, — they 
moved with a ruthless energy that paralyzed their 
opponents, the worn-out, tottering, crazy despot- 
isms, rotten with vice, despicable in their ludicrous 
pride of caste, moribund in their military pedantry 
and foredoomed to perish in the conflict they had 
courted. The days of Danton and Robespierre 
are not days to which a French patriot cares to 
look back; but at any rate he can regard them 
without the shame he must feel when he thinks of 



t.w 



Minister to France 253 

the times of Louis Ouinze. Danton and his Hke, 
at least, were men, and stood far, far above the 
palsied coward — a eimuch in his lack of all virile 
virtues — who misruled France for half a century ; 
who, with his followers, indulged in every crime 
and selfish vice known, save only such as needed 
a particle of strength, or the least courage, in the 
committing. 

Morris first met Dumouriez when the latter was 
minister of foreign affairs, shortly before the poor 
king was driven from the Tuileries. He dined 
with him, and afterward noted down that the 
society was noisy and in bad style ; for the grace 
and charm of French social life were gone, and the 
raw republicans were ill at ease in the drawing- 
room. At this time Morris commented often on 
the change in the look of Paris: all his gay 
friends gone ; the city somber and tmeasy. When 
he walked through the streets, in the stifling air of 
a summer hot beyond precedent, as if the elements 
sympathized with the passions of men, he met, 
instead of the brilliant company of former days, 
only the few peaceable citizens left, hurrying on 
their ways with frightened watchfulness; or else 
groups of lolling ruffians, with sinister eyes and 
brutalized faces ; or he saw in the Champs de Mars 
squalid ragamuffins signing the petition for the 
decheance. 

Morris wrote Washington that Dumouriez was 



254 Gouverneur Morris 

a bold, determined man, bitterly hostile to the 
Jacobins and all the extreme revolutionary clubs, 
and, once he was in power, willing to risk his own 
life in the effort to put them down. However, the 
hour of the Jacobins had not yet struck, and the 
revolution had now been permitted to gather such 
headway that it could be stopped only by a master 
genius ; and Dumouriez was none such. 

Still he was an able man, and, as Morris wrote 
home, in his military operations he combined the 
bravery of a skilled soldier and the arts of an 
astute politician. To be sure, his victories were 
not in themselves very noteworthy ; the artillery 
skirmish at Valmy was decided by the reluctance 
of the Germans to come on, not by the ability of 
the French to withstand them ; and at Jemappes 
the imperialists were hopelessly outnumbered. 
Still the results were most important, and Du- 
mouriez overran Flanders in the face of hostile 
Europe. He at once proceeded to revolutionize 
the government of his conquest in the most ap- 
proved French fashion, which was that all the 
neighbors of France should receive liberty whether 
or no, and should moreover pay the expense of 
having it thrust upon them ; accordingly he issued 
a proclamation to his new fellow citizens, "which 
might be summed up in a few words as being an 
order to them to be free forthwith, according to his 
ideas of freedom, on pain of military execution." 



Minister to France 255 

He had things all his own way for the moment, 
but after a while he was defeated by the Germans ; 
then, while the Gironde tottered to its fall, he fled 
to the very foes he had been fighting, as the only 
way of escaping death from the men whose favo- 
rite he had been. Morris laughed bitterly at the 
fickle people. One anecdote he gives is worth 
preserving: "It is a year ago that a person who 
mixed in tumults to see what was doing, told me 
of a sans-culottes who,bellowing against poor Lafay- 
ette, when Petion appeared, changed at once his 
note to ' Vive Petion!' and then, turning round to 
one of his companions, ' Vois tu ! C'est notre ami, 
n'est ce pas? Eh bien, il passera comme les au- 
tres.' And, lo! the prophecy is fulfilled; and I 
this instant learn that Petion, confined to his room 
as a traitor or conspirator, has fled, on the 24th of 
June, 1793, from those whom he sent, on the 20th 
of June, 1792, to assault the king in the Tuileries. 
In short you will find, in the list of those who 
were ordered by their brethren to be arrested, the 
names of those who have proclaimed themselves to 
be the prime movers of the revolution of the loth 
of August, and the fathers of the republic." 

About the time the sans-culottes had thus bel- 
lowed against Lafayette, the latter met Morris, for 
the first time since he was presented at court as 
minister, and at once spoke to him in his tone 
of ancient familiarity. The Frenchman had been 



256 Gouverneur Morris 

brought at last to realize the truth of his Ameri- 
can friend's theories and predictions. It was much 
too late to save himself, however. After the loth 
of August he was proclaimed by the Assembly, 
found his troops falling away from him, and fled 
over the frontier ; only to be thrown into prison by 
the allied monarchs, who acted with their usual 
folly and baseness. Morris, contemptuously im- 
patient of the part he had played, wrote of him : 
"Thus his circle is completed. He has spent his 
fortime on a revolution, and is now crushed by the 
wheel which he put in motion. He lasted longer 
than I expected." But this momentary indigna- 
tion soon gave way to a generous sympathy for the 
man who had served America so well, and who, 
if without the great abilities necessary to grapple 
with the tumult of French affairs, had yet always 
acted with such unselfish purity of motive. La- 
fayette, as soon as he was imprisoned, wrote to the 
American minister in Holland, alleging that he 
had surrendered his position as a French subject 
and was now an American citizen, and requesting 
the American representatives in Europe to procure 
his release. His claim was of course untenable; 
and, though the American government did all it 
could on his behalf through its foreign ministers, 
and though Washington himself wrote a strong 
letter of appeal to the Austrian emperor, he re- 
mained in prison until the peace, several years later. 



Minister to France 257 

All Lafayette's fortune was gone, and while in 
prison he was reduced to want. As soon as Mor- 
ris heard this, he had the sum of ten thousand 
florins forwarded to the prisoner by the United 
States bankers at Amsterdam; pledging his own 
security for the amount, which was, however, 
finally allowed by the government under the name 
of compensation for Lafayette's military services 
in America. IVIorris was even more active in 
befriending Madame de Lafayette and her chil- 
dren. To the former he lent from his own private 
fimds a hundred thousand livres, enabling her to 
pay her debts to the many poor people who had 
rendered services to her family. To the proud, 
sensitive lady the relief was great, much though 
it hurt her to be imder any obligation ; she wrote 
to her friend that he had broken the chains that 
loaded her down, and had done it in a way that 
made her feel the consolation, rather than the 
weight, of the obligation. But he was to do still 
more for her; for, when she was cast into prison 
by the savage Parisian mob, his active influence 
on her behalf saved her from death. In a letter 
to him, written some time later, she says, after 
speaking of the money she had borrowed: "This 
is a slight obligation, it is true, compared with that 
of my life, but allow me to remember both while 
life lasts, with a sentiment of gratitude which it 
is precious to feel." 
17 



258 Gouverneur Morris 

There were others whose fortunes turned with 
the wheel of fate, for whom Morris felt no such 
sympathy as for the Lafayettes. Among the num- 
ber was the Duke of Orleans, now transformed 
into citoyen Egalite. Morris credited this grace- 
less debauchee with criminal ambitions which he 
probably did not possess, saying that he doubted \{ 

the public virtue of a profligate, and could not help 
distrusting such a man's pretensions; nor is it 
likely that he regretted much the fate of the man 
who died imder the same guillotine which, with y, 

his assent, had fallen on the neck of the king, his 
cousin. 

It needed no small amount of hardihood for a 
man of Morris's prominence and avowed senti- 
ments to stay in Paris when Death was mowing 
round him with a swath at once so broad and so 
irregular. The power was passing rapidly from 
hand to hand, through a succession of men fairly 
crazy in their indifference to bloodshed. Not a 
single other minister of a neutral nation dared 
stay. In fact, the foreign representatives were 
preparing to go away even before the final stroke 
was given to the monarchy, and soon after the 
loth of August the entire corps diplomatique left 
Paris as rapidly as the various members could get 
their passports. These the new republican gov- 
ernment was at first very reluctant to grant; 
indeed, when the Venetian ambassador started off 



Minister to France 259 

he was very ignominiously treated and brought 
back. Morris went to the British ambassador's 
to take leave, having received much kindness from 
him, and having been very intimate in his house. 
He foimd Lord Gower in a tearing passion because 
he could not get passports; he had burned his 
papers, and strongly advised his guest to do like- 
wise. On this advice the latter refused to act, nor 
would he take the broad hints given him to the 
effect that honor required him to quit the country. 
Morris could not help showing his amusement at 
the fear and anger exhibited at the ambassador's, 
"which exhibition of spirits his lordship could 
hardly bear." Talleyrand, who was getting his 
own passport, also did all in his power to persuade 
the American minister to leave, but without avail. 
Morris was not a man to be easily shaken in any 
determination he had taken after careful thought. 
He wrote back to Jefferson that his opinion was 
directly opposed to the views of such people as 
had tried to persuade him that his own honor, and 
that of America, required him to leave France; 
and that he was inclined to attribute such counsel 
mainly to fear. It was true that the position was 
not without danger ; but he presumed that, when 
the President named him to the embassy, it was 
not for his own personal pleasure or safety, but 
for the interests of the country; and these he 
could certainly serve best by staying. 



26o Gouverneur Morris 

He was able to hold his own only by a mixture 
of tact and firmness. Any signs of flinching would 
have ruined him outright. He would submit to 
no insolence. The minister of foreign affairs was, 
with his colleagues, engaged in certain schemes in 
reference to the American debt, which were de- 
signed to further their own private interests ; he 
tried to bully Morris into acquiescence, and, on 
the latter's point-blank refusal, sent him a most 
insulting letter. Morris promptly retorted by 
demanding his passports. France, however, was 
very desirous not to break with the United States, 
the only friend she had left in the world ; and the 
offending minister sent a sullen letter of apology, 
asking him to reconsider his intention to leave, 
and offering entire satisfaction for every point of 
which he complained. Accordingly Morris stayed. 

He was, however, continually exposed to insults 
and worries, which were always apologized for by 
the government for the time being, on the groimd, 
no doubt true, that in such a period of convul- 
sions it was impossible to control their subordinate 
agents. Indeed, the changes from one form of 
anarchy to another went on so rapidly that the 
laws of nations had small chance of observance. 

One evening a number of people, headed by a 
commissary of the section, entered his house, and 
demanded to search it for arms said to be hidden 
therein. Morris took a high tone, and was very 



f 
? 



Minister to France 261 

peremptory with them ; told them that they should 
not examine his house, that it held no arms, and 
moreover that, if he had possessed any, they 
should not touch one of them ; he also demanded 
the name of "the blockhead or rascal" who had 
informed against him, annoimcing his intention 
to bring him to punishment. Finally he got them 
out of the house, and the next morning the com- 
missary called with many apologies, which were 
accepted. 

Another time he was arrested in the street for 
not having a carte de citoyen, but he was released 
as soon as it was found out who he was. Again he 
was arrested while traveling in the cotmtry, on the 
pretense that his passport was out of date; an 
insult for which the government at once made what 
amends they could. His house was also visited 
another time by armed men, whom, as before, he 
persuaded to go away. Once or twice, in the pop- 
ular tumults, even his life was in danger; on one 
occasion it is said that it was only saved by the 
fact of his having a wooden leg, which made him 
known to the mob as "a cripple of the American 
war for freedom." Rumors even got abroad in 
England and America that he had been assas- 
sinated. 

Morris's duties were manifold, and as harassing 
to himself as they were beneficial to his country. 
Sometimes he would interfere on behalf of America 



262 Gouverneur Morris 

as a whole, and endeavor to get obnoxious decrees 
of the Assembly repealed ; and again he would try 
to save some private citizen of the United States 
who had got himself into difficulties. Reports of 
the French minister of foreign affairs, as well as 
reports of the comite de saint public, alike bear 
testimony to the success of his endeavors, when- 
ever success was possible, and unconsciously show 
the value of the services he rendered to his coun- 
try. Of course it was often impossible to obtain 
complete redress, because, as Morris wrote home, 
the government, while all-powerful in certain cases, 
was in others not merely feeble, but enslaved, and 
was often obliged to commit acts the consequences 
of which the nominal leaders both saw and la- 
mented. Morris also, while doing all he could for 
his fellow-citizens, was often obliged to choose 
between their interests and those of the nation at 
large; and he, of course, decided in favor of the 
latter, though well aware of the clamor that was 
certain to be raised against him in consequence by 
those who, as he caustically remarked, found it the 
easiest thing in the world to get anything they 
wanted from the French government tintil they 
had tried. 

One of his most important transactions was in 
reference to paying off the debt due by America 
for amounts loaned her during the war for inde- 
pendence. The interest and a part of the prin- 



I 



Minister to France 263 

cipal had already been paid. At the time Morris 
was made minister, the United States had a large 
sum of money, destined for the payment of the 
public debt, lying idle in the hands of the bankers 
at Amsterdam; and this sum both Morris and 
the American minister to Holland, Mr. Short, 
thought could be well applied to the payment of 
part of our remaining obligation to France. The 
French government was consulted, and agreed to 
receive the sum; but hardly was the agreement 
entered into before the monarchy was overturned. 
The question at once arose as to whether the money 
could be rightfully paid over to the men who had 
put themselves at the head of affairs, and who, a 
month hence, might themselves be ousted by 
others who would not acknowledge the validity of 
a payment made to them. Short thought the 
payment should be stopped, and, as it afterward 
turned out, the home authorities agreed with him. 
But Morris thought otherwise, and paid over the 
amount. Events fully justified his course, for 
France never made any difficulty in the matter, 
and even had she done so, as Morris remarked, 
America had the staff in her own hands, and could 
walk which way she pleased, for she owed more 
money, and in the final adjustment could insist 
on the amount paid being allowed on accoimt of 
the debt. 

The French executive council owed Montis grati- 



264 Gouverneur Morris 

tude for his course in this matter ; but they became 
intensely irritated with him shortly afterward 
because he refused to fall in with certain proposals 
they made to him as to the manner of applying 
part of the debt to the purchase of provisions and 
munitions for San Domingo. Morris had good 
reason to believe that there was a private specula- 
tion at the bottom of this proposal, and declined 
to accede to it. The urgency with which it was 
made, and the wrath which his course excited, 
confirmed his suspicions, and he persisted in his 
refusal although it almost brought about a break 
with the men then carrying on the government. 
Afterward, when these men fell with the Gironde, 
he wrote home: " I mentioned to you the plan of 
a speculation on drafts to have been made on the 
United States, could my concurrence have been 
procured. Events have shown that this specula- 
tion would have been a good one to the parties, 
who would have gained (and the French nation of 
course have lost) about fifty thousand pounds ster- 
ling in eighty thousand. I was informed at that 
time that the disappointed parties would attempt 
to have me recalled, and some more tractable char- 
acter sent, who would have the good sense to look 
after his own interest. Well, sir, nine months 
have elapsed, and now, if I were capable of such 
things, I think it would be no difficult matter to 
have some of them hanged; indeed it is highly 



m 



Minister to France 265 

probable that they will experience a fate of that 
sort." 

Much of his time was also taken up in remon- 
starting against the attacks of French privateers 
on American shipping. These, however, went 
steadily on until, half a dozen years afterward, we 
took the matter into our own hands, and in the 
West Indies inflicted a smart drubbing, not only 
on the privateers of France, but on her regular 
men-of-war as well. He also did what he could 
for the French officers who had served in America 
during the war for independence, most of whom 
were forced to flee from France after the outbreak 
of the revolution. 

His letters home, even after his regular duties 
had begun to be engrossing, contained a running 
commentary on the events that were passing 
around him. His forecasts of events within 
France were remarkably shrewd, and he displayed 
a wonderful insight into the motives and charac- 
ters of the various leaders ; but at first he was all 
at sea in his estimate of the military situation, 
being much more at home among statesmen than 
soldiers. He had expected the allied sovereigns 
to make short work of the raw Republican armies, 
and was amazed at the success of the latter. But 
he very soon realized how the situation stood ; that 
whereas the Austrian and Prussian troops simply 
came on in well-drilled, reluctant obedience to 



266 Gouverneur Morris 

their commanding officers, the soldiers of France, 
on the contrary, were actuated by a fiery spirit 
the like of which had hardly been seen since the 
crusades. The bitterness of the contest was appal- 
ling, and so was the way in which the ranks of the 
contestants were thinned out. The extreme repub- 
licans believed in their creed with a furious faith ; 
and they were joined by their fellow citizens with 
an almost equal zeal, when once it had become 
evident that the invaders were hostile not only to 
the Republic but to France itself, and very possi- 
bly meditated its dismemberment. 

When the royal and imperial forces invaded 
France in 1792, they threatened such ferocious 
vengeance as to excite the most desperate resist- 
ance, and yet they backed up their high-sounding 
words by deeds so faulty, weak, and slow as to 
make themselves objects of contempt rather than 
dread. The Duke of Brunswick, in particular, as 
a prelude to some very harmless military maneu- 
vers, issued a singularly lurid and foolish mani- 
festo, announcing that he would deliver up Paris 
to utter destruction and would give over all the 
soldiers he captured to military execution. Morris 
said that his address was in substance, "Be all 
against me, for I am opposed to you all, and make 
a good resistance, for there is no longer any hope ;" 
and added that it would have been wiser to have 
begun with some great success and then to have 









Minister to France 267 

carried the danger near those whom it was desired 
to intimidate. As it was, the duke's campaign 
failed ignominiously, and all the invaders were 
driven back, for France rose as one man, her war- 
riors overflowed on every side, and bore down all 
her foes by sheer weight of numbers and impetu- 
ous enthusiasm. Her government was a despotism 
as well as an anarchy; it was as totally free from 
the drawbacks as from the advantages of the demo- 
cratic system that it professed to embody. Noth- 
ing could exceed the merciless energy of the 
measures adopted. Halfway wickedness might 
have failed ; but a wholesale murder of the disaf- 
fected, together with a confiscation of all the goods 
of the rich, and a vigorous conscription of the poor 
for soldiers, secured success, at least for the time 
being. The French made it a war of men ; so that 
the price of labor rose enormously at once, and the 
condition of the working classes forthwith changed 
greatly for the better — one good result of the revo- 
lution, at any rate. 

Morris wrote home very soon after the loth of 
August that the then triumphant revolutionists, 
the Girondists or party of Brissot, who had sup- 
planted the moderate party of Lafayette exactly 
as the latter had succeeded the aristocracy, would 
soon in their turn be overthrown by men even 
more extreme and even more bloodthirsty; and 
that thus it would go on, wave after wave, until 



268 Gouverneur Morris 

at last the wizard arose who could still them. By 
the end of the year the storm had brewed long 
enough to be near the bursting point. One of the 
promoters of the last outbreak, now himself marked 
as a victim, told Morris that he personally would 
die hard, but that most of his colleagues, though 
like him doomed to destruction, and though so 
fierce in dealing with the moderate men, now 
showed neither the nerve nor hardihood that alone 
could stave off the catastrophe. 

Meanwhile the king, as Morris wrote home, 
showed in his death a better spirit than his life 
had promised ; for he died in a manner becoming 
his dignity, with calm courage, praying that his 
foes might be forgiven and his deluded people be 
benefited by his death, — his words from the scaf- 
fold being drowned by the drums of Santerre. As 
a whole, the Gironde had opposed putting the king 
to death, and thus capping the structure whose 
foundations they had laid ; they held back all too 
late. The fabric of their system was erected on a 
quagmire, and it now settled down and crushed 
the men who had built it. "All people of morality 
and intelligence had long agreed that as yet 
republican virtues were not of Gallic growth;" 
and so the power slipped naturally into the grasp 
of the lowest and most violent, of those who were 
loudest to claim the possession of republican prin- 
ciples, while in practice showing that they had not 



Minister to France 269 

even the dimmest idea of what such principles 
meant. 

The leaders were quite at the mercy of the gusts 
of fierce passion that swayed the breasts of their 
brutal followers. Morris wrote home that the 
nominal rulers, or rather the few by whom these 
rulers were directed, had finally gained very just 
ideas of the value of popular opinion; but that 
they were not in a condition to act according to 
their knowledge; and that if they were able to 
reach harbor there would be quite as much of 
good luck as of good management about it, and, 
at any rate, a part of the crew would have to be 
thrown overboard. 

Then the Mountain rose under Danton and 
Marat, and the party of the Gironde was entirely 
put down. The leaders were cast into prison, 
with the certainty before their eyes that the first 
great misfortune to France would call them from 
their dimgeons to act as expiatory victims. The 
Jacobins ruled supreme, and under them the gov- 
ernment became a despotism in principle as well as 
in practice. Part of the Convention arrested the 
rest; and the revolutionary tribunals ruled red- 
handed, with a whimsical and ferocious tyranny. 
Said Morris: "It is an emphatical phrase among 
the patriots that terror is the order of the day; 
some years have elapsed since Montesquieu wrote 
that the principle of arbitrary governments is 



270 Gouverneur Morris 

fear." The prisons were choked with suspects, 
and blood flowed more freely than ever. Terror 
had reached its highest point. Danton was soon 
to fall before Robespierre. Among a host of other \ 

victims the queen died, with a brave dignity that f, 

made people half forget her manifold faults ; and 
Philippe EgaHte, the dissolute and unprincipled 
scoundrel, after a life than which none could be 
meaner and more unworthy, now at the end went 
to his death with calm and unflinching courage. 

One man had a very narrow escape. This was 
Thomas Paine, the Englishman, who had at one 
period rendered such a striking service to the 
cause of American independence, while the rest of 
his life had been as ignoble as it was varied. He 
had been elected to the Convention, and, having 
sided with the Gironde, was thrown into prison by 
the Jacobins. He at once asked Morris to demand 
him as an American citizen ; a title to which he 
of course had no claim. Morris refused to inter- 
fere too actively, judging rightly that Paine would 
be saved by his own insignificance and would serve 
his own interests best by keeping still. So the 
filthy Httle atheist had to stay in prison, "where 
he amused himself with publishing a pamphlet 
against Jesus Christ." There are infidels and infi- 
dels; Paine belonged to the variety — whereof 
America possesses at present one or two shining 
examples— that apparently esteems a bladder of 



Minister to France 271 

dirty water as the proper weapon with which to 
assail Christianity. It is not a type that appeals 
to the sympathy of an onlooker, be said onlooker 
religious or otherwise. 

Morris never paid so much heed to the military 
events as to the progress of opinion in France, 
believing " that such a great country must depend 
more upon interior sentiment than exterior opera- 
tions." He took a half melancholy, half sardonic 
interest in the overthrow of the Catholic religion 
by the revolutionists ; who had assailed it with the 
true French weapon, ridicule, but ridicule of a very 
grim and unpleasant kind. The people who five 
years before had fallen down in the dirt as the con- 
secrated matter passed by, now danced the carma- 
gnole in holy vestments, and took part in some 
other mummeries a great deal more blasphemous. 
At the famous Feast of Reason, which Morris 
described as a kind of opera performed in Notre 
Dame, the president of the Convention, and other 
public characters, adored on bended knees a girl 
who stood in the place ci-devant most holy to 
personate Reason herself. This girl, Saunier by 
name, followed the trades of an opera dancer and 
harlot ; she was "very beautiful and next door to 
an idiot as to her intellectual gifts." Among her 
feats was having appeared in a ballet in a dress 
especially designed, by the painter David, at her 
bidding, to be more indecent than nakedness. 



V 



272 Gouverneur Morris 

Altogether she was admirably fitted, both morally 
and mentally, to personify the kind of reason 
shown and admired by the French revolutionists. 

Writing to a friend who was especially hostile to 
Romanism, ]\Iorris once remarked, with the humor 
that tinged even his most serious thoughts, "Every 
day of my life gives me reason to question my own 
infallibility ; and of course leads me farther from 
confiding in that of the pope. But I have lived to 
see a new religion arise. It consists in a denial of 
all religion, and its votaries have the superstition 
of not being superstitious. They have this with as 
much zeal as any other sect, and are as ready to 
lay waste the world in order to make proselytes." 
Another time, speaking of his country place at 
Sainport, to which he had retired from Paris, he 
wrote: "We are so scorched by a long drought 
that in spite of all philosophic notions we are 
beginning our procession to obtain the favor of the 
bon dieu. Were it proper for un homme public et 
protestani to interfere, I should be tempted to 
tell them that mercy is before sacrifice." Those 
individuals of arrested mental development who 
now make pilgrimages to our Lady of Lourdes had 
plenty of prototypes, even in the atheistical France 
of the revolution. 

In his letters home Morris occasionally made 
clear-headed comments on American affairs. He 
considered that "we should be unwise in the ex- 



Minister to France 273 

treme to involve ourselves in the contests of Euro- 
pean nations, where our weight could be but small, 
though the loss to ourselves would be certain. We 
ought to be extremely watchful of foreign affairs, 
but there is a broad line between vigilance and 
activity." Both France and England had violated 
their treaties with us ; but the latter "had behaved 
worst, and with deliberate intention." He espe- 
cially laid stress upon the need of our having a 
navy; "with twenty ships of the line at sea no 
nation on earth will dare to insult us ;" even aside 
from individual losses, five years of war would in- 
volve more national expense than the support of 
a navy for twenty years, and until we rendered 
ourselves respectable, we should continue to be in- 
sulted. He never showed greater wisdom than in 
his views about our navy ; and his party, the Fed- 
eralists, started to give us one ; but it had hardly 
been begxm before the Jeffersonians came into 
power, and, with singular foolishness, stopped the 
work. 

Washington heartily sympathized with Morris's 
views as to the French Revolution ; he wrote him 
that events had more than made good his gloomiest 
predictions. Jefferson, however, was utterly op- 
posed to his theories, and was much annoyed at 
the forcible way in which he painted things as they 
were; characteristically enough, he only showed 
his annoyance by indirect methods, — leaving 
18 



274 Gouverneur Morris 

Morris's letters unanswered, keeping him in the 
dark as to events at home, etc. Morris under- 
stood all this perfectly, and was extremely relieved 
when Randolph became secretary of state in Jef- 
ferson's stead. Almost immediately afterward, 
however, he was himself recalled. The United 
States, having requested the French government 
to withdraw Genet, a harlequin rather than a 
diplomat, it was done at once, and in return a 
request was forwarded that the United States 
would reciprocate by relieving Morris, which of 
course had to be done also. The revolutionary 
authorities both feared and disliked Morris; he 
could neither be flattered nor bullied, and he was 
known to disapprove of their excesses. They also 
took umbrage at his haughtiness ; an unfortunate 
expression he used in one of his official letters to 
them, "ma cour," gave great offense, as being 
imrepublican — precisely as they had previously 
objected to Washington's using the phrase "your 
people" in writing to the king. 

Washington wrote him a letter warmly approv- 
ing of his past conduct. Nevertheless Morris was 
not over-pleased at being recalled. He thought 
that, as things then were in France, any minister 
who gave satisfaction to its government would 
prove forgetful of the interests of America. He 
was probably right; at any rate, what he feared 
was just what happened luider his successor, 



i'l 



il 






Minister to France 275 

Monroe — a very amiable gentleman, but distinctly 
one who comes in the category of those whose 
greatness is thrust upon them. However, under 
the circumstances, it was probably impossible for 
our government to avoid recalling Morris. 

He could say truthfully: "I have the consola- 
tion to have made no sacrifice either of personal 
or national dignity, and I believe I should have 
obtained everything if the American government 
had refused to recall me." His services had been 
invaluable to us ; he had kept our national repu- 
tation at a high point, by the scrupulous heed with 
which he saw that all our obligations were fulfilled, 
as well as by the firm courage with which he in- 
sisted on our rights being granted us. He believed 
"that all our treaties, however onerous, must be 
strictly fulfilled according to their true intent and 
meaning. The honest nation is that which, like 
the honest man, 'hath to its phghted faith and 
vow forever firmly stood, and though it promise to 
its loss, yet makes that promise good;'" and in 
return he demanded that others should mete to us 
the same justice we meted to them. He met each 
difficulty the instant it arose, ever on the alert to 
protect his country and his countrymen ; and what 
an ordinary diplomat could barely have done in 
time of peace, he succeeded in doing amid the 
wild, shifting tumult of the revolution, when 
almost every step he made was at his own personal 



276 Gouverneur Morris 

hazard. He took precisely the right stand ; had 
he taken too hostile a position, he would have 
been driven from the country, whereas had he 
been a sympathizer, he would have more or less 
compromised America, as his successor afterward 
did. We have never had a foreign minister who 
deserved more honor than Morris. 

One of the noteworthy features in his letters 
home was the accuracy with which he foretold the 
course of events in the political world. Luzerne 
once said to him, "Vous dites toujours les choses 
extraordinaires qui se realisent ; " and many other 
men, after some given event had taken place, were 
obliged to confess their wonder at the way in 
which Morris's predictions concerning it had been 
verified. A notable instance was his writing to 
Washington : " Whatever may be the lot of France 
in remote futurity ... it seems evident that she 
must soon be governed by a single despot. 
Whether she will pass to that point through the 
medium of a triumvirate or other small body of 
men, seems as yet undetermined. I think it most 
probable that she will." This was certainly a 
remarkably accurate forecast as to the precise 
stages by which the already existing despotism 
was to be concentrated in a single individual. He 
always insisted that, though it was difficult to 
foretell how a single man would act, yet it was 
easy with regard to a mass of men, for their 



Minister to France 277 

peculiarities neutralized each other, and it was 
necessary only to pay heed to the instincts of the 
average animal. He also gave wonderfully clear- 
cut sketches of the more prominent actors in 
affairs; although one of his maxims was that "in 
examining historical facts we are too apt to 
ascribe to individuals the events which are pro- 
duced by general causes." Danton, for instance, 
he described as always believing, and, what was 
worse for himself, maintaining, that a popular 
system of government was absurd in France ; that 
the people were too ignorant, too inconstant, too 
corrupt, and felt too much the need of a master; 
in short, that they had reached the point where 
Cato was a madman, and Caesar a necessary evil. 
He acted on these principles; but he was too 
voluptuous for his ambition, too indolent to 
acquire supreme power, and he cared for great 
wealth rather than great fame ; so he " fell at the 
feet of Robespierre." Similarly, said Morris, there 
passed away all the men of the loth of August, 
all the men of the 2d of September ; the same mob 
that hounded them on with wild applause when 
they grasped the blood-stained reins of power, 
a few months later hooted at them with ferocious 
derision as they went their way to the guillotine. 
Paris ruled France, and the sans-culottes ruled 
Paris; factions continually arose, waging inex- 
plicable war, each in turn acquiring a momentary 



278 Gouverneur Morris 

influence which was foiinded on fear alone, and 
all alike unable to build up any stable or lasting 
government. 

Each new stroke of the guillotine weakened the 
force of liberal sentiment, and diminished the 
chances of a free system. Morris wondered only 
that, in a country ripe for a tyrant's rule, four 
years of convulsions among twenty-four millions 
of people had brought forth neither a soldier nor 
yet a statesman, whose head was fitted to wear 
the cap that fortune had woven. Despising the 
mob as utterly as did Oliver Cromwell himself, 
and realizing the supine indifference with which 
the French people were willing to accept a master, 
he yet did full justice to the pride with which 
they resented outside attack, and the enthusiasm 
with which they faced their foes. He saw the 
immense resources possessed by a nation to whom 
war abroad was a necessity for the preservation of 
peace at home, and with whom bankruptcy was 
but a starting-point for fresh efforts. The whole 
energy and power lay in the hands of the revo- 
lutionists; the men of the old regime had fled, 
leaving only that "waxen substance," the prop- 
ertied class, "who in foreign wars count so much, 
and in civil wars so little." He had no patience 
with those despicable beings, the traders and mer- 
chants who have forgotten how to fight, the rich 
who are too timid to guard their wealth, the men 



Minister to France 279 

of property, large or small, who need peace, and 
yet have not the sense and courage to be always 
prepared to conquer it. 

In his whole attitude toward the revolution, 
Morris represents better than any other man the 
clear-headed, practical statesman, who is genu- 
inely devoted to the cause of constitutional 
freedom. He was utterly opposed to the old 
system of privilege on the one hand, and to the 
wild excesses of the fanatics on the other. The 
few liberals of the revolution were the only men 
in it who deserve our true respect. The repub- 
licans who champion the deeds of the Jacobins are 
traitors to their own principles; for the spirit of 
Jacobinism, instead of being identical with, is dia- 
metrically opposed to the spirit of true liberty. 
Jacobinism, socialism, communism, nihilism, and 
anarchism, — these are the real foes of a demo- 
cratic republic, for each one, if it obtains control, 
obtains it only as the sure forerunner of a despotic 
tyranny and of some form of the one-man power. 

Morris, an American, took a clearer and truer 
view of the French Revolution than did any of 
the contemporary European observers. Yet while 
with them it was the all-absorbing event of the 
age, with him, as is evident by his writings, it was 
merely an important episode; for to him it was 
dwarfed by the American Revolution of a decade 
or two back. To the Europeans of the present 



28o 



Gouverneur Morris 



day, as yet hardly awake to the fact that already 
the change has begun that will make Europe but 
a fragment, instead of the whole, of the civilized 
world, the French Revolution is the great his- 
torical event of our times. But in reality it 
affected only the people of western and central 
Europe; not the Russians, not the English- 
speaking nations, not the Spaniards who dwelt 
across the Atlantic. America and Australia had 
their destinies molded by the crisis of 1776, not 
by the crisis of 1789. What the French Revo- 
lution was to the states within Europe, that the 
American Revolution was to the continents 
without. 



I 



M' 



CHAPTER XI. 

STAY IN EUROPE. 

ONROE, as Morris's successor, entered, upon 
his new duties with an immense flourish, 
and rapidly gave a succession of startling 
proofs that he was a minister altogether too much 
to the taste of the frenzied Jacobinical republi- 
cans to whom he was accredited. Indeed, his 
capers were almost as extraordinary as their own, 
and. seem rather like the antics of some of the 
early French commanders in Canada, in their 
efforts to ingratiate themselves with their Indian 
allies, than like the performance we should expect 
from a sober Virginian gentleman on a mission to 
a civilized nation. He stayed long enough to get 
our affairs into a snarl, and was then recalled by 
Washington, receiving from the latter more than 
one scathing rebuke. 

However, the fault was really less with him 
than with his party and with those who sent him. 
Monroe was an honorable man with a very un- 
original mind, and he simply reflected the wild, 
foolish views held by all his fellows of the Jeffer- 
sonian democratic-republican school concerning 
France — for our politics were still French and 
English, but not yet American. His appointment 

281 



282 Gouverneur Morris 

was an excellent example of the folly of trying 
to carry on a government on a "non-partisan" 
basis. Washington was only gradually weaned 
from this theory by bitter experience; both Jef- 
ferson and Monroe helped to teach him the lesson. 
It goes without saying that in a well-ordered gov- 
ernment the great bulk of the employees in the 
civil service, the men whose functions are merely 
to execute faithfully routine departmental work, 
should hold office during good behavior, and 
should be appointed without reference to their 
politics ; but if the higher public servants, such as 
the heads of departments and the foreign minis- 
ters, are not in complete accord with their chief, 
the only result can be to introduce halting inde- 
cision and vacillation into the counsels of the 
nation, without gaining a single compensating 
advantage, and without abating by one iota the 
virulence of party passion. To appoint Monroe, 
an extreme Democrat, to France, while at the 
same time appointing Jay, a strong Federalist, to 
England, was not only an absurdity which did 
nothing toward reconciling the Federalists and 
Democrats, but, bearing in mind how these parties 
stood respectively toward England and France, it 
was also an actual wrong, for it made our foreign 
policy seem double-faced and deceitful. While 
one minister was formally embracing such of the 
Parisian statesmen as had hitherto escaped the 



I 



John Jay. 



I 





'yi^^^ty^t^e^^;^ty //u^^t'UJ- 



Ml 



Stay in Europe 283 

guillotine, and was going through various other 
theatrical performances that do not appeal to any 
but a Gallic mind, his fellow was engaged in nego- 
tiating a treaty in England that was so obnoxious 
to France as almost to bring us to a rupture with 
her. The Jay treaty was not altogether a good 
one, and a better might perhaps have been secured ; 
still, it was better than nothing, and Washington 
was right in urging its adoption, even while admit- 
ting that it was not entirely satisfactory. But 
certainly, if we intended to enter into such engage- 
ments with Great Britain, it was rank injustice to 
both Monroe and France to send such a man as 
the former to such a coimtry as the latter. 

Meanwhile Morris, instead of returning to 
America, was forced by his business affairs to 
prolong his stay abroad for several years. During 
this time he journeyed at intervals through Eng- 
land, the Netherlands, Germany, Prussia, and 
Austria. His European reputation was well 
established, and he was everywhere received 
gladly into the most distinguished society of the 
time. What made him especially welcome was 
his having now definitely taken sides with the 
anti-revolutionists in the great conflict of arms 
and opinions then raging through Europe; and 
his brilliancy, the boldness with which he had 
behaved as minister during the terror, and the 
reputation given him by the French emigres, all 



284 Gouverneur Morris 

joined to cause him to be hailed with pleasure by 
the aristocratic party. It is really curious to see 
the consideration with which he was everywhere 
treated, although again a mere private individual, 
and the terms of intimacy on which he was ad- 
mitted into the most exclusive social and diplo- 
matic circles at the various courts. He thus 
became an intimate friend of many of the foremost 
people of the period. His political observation, 
however, became less trustworthy than hereto- 
fore; for he was undoubtedly soured by his 
removal, and the excesses of the revolutionists 
had excited such horror in his mind as to make 
him no longer an impartial judge. His forecasts 
and judgments on the military situation in par- 
ticular, although occasionally right, were usually 
very wild. He fully appreciated Napoleon's utter 
unscrupulousness and marvelous mendacity; but 
to the end of his life he remained unwilling to do 
justice to the emperor's still more remarkable war- 
like genius, going so far, after the final Russian 
campaign, as to speak of old Kutusoff as his equal. 
Indeed, in spite of one or two exceptions, — nota- 
bly his predicting almost the exact date of the 
retreat from Moscow, — his criticisms on Napo- 
leon's military operations do not usually stand 
much above the rather ludicrous level recently 
reached by Coimt Tolstoi. 

Morris was relieved by Monroe in August, 1794* 



Stay in Europe 285 

and left Paris for Switzeriand in October. He 
stopped at Coppet and spent a day with Madame 
de Stael, where there was a little French society 
that lived at her expense and was as gay as cir- 
cumstances would permit. He had never been par- 
ticularly impressed with the much-vaunted society 
of the salon, and this small survival thereof cer- 
tainly had no overpowering attraction for him, if 
we may judge by the entry in his diary: "The 
road to her house is up-hill and execrable, and I 
think I shall not again go thither." Mankind was 
still blind to the grand beauty of the Alps, — it 
must be remembered that the admiration of 
moimtain scenery is, to the shame of our fore- 
fathers be it said, almost a growth of the present 
century, — and Morris took more interest in the 
Swiss .population than in their surroundings. He 
wrote that in Switzerland the spirit of commerce 
had brought about a baseness of morals which 
nothing could cure but the same spirit carried 
still farther: "It teaches eventually fair dealing 
as the most profitable dealing. The first lesson 
of trade is. My son, get money. The second is. 
My son, get money, honestly if you can, but get 
money. The third is, My son, get money; but 
honestly, if you would get much money." 

He went to Great Britain in the following sum- 
mer, and spent a year there. At one time he 
visited the North, staying with the Dukes of 



286 Gouverneur Morris 

Argyle, Atholl, and Montrose, and was very much 
pleased with Scotland, where everything he saw 
convinced him that the country was certain of a 
rapid and vigorous growth. On his return he 
stopped with the Bishop of Landaff, at Colgate 
Park. The bishop announced that he was a 
stanch opposition man, and a firm Whig; to 
which statement Morris adds in his diary: "Let 
this be as it will, he is certainly a good landlord 
and a man of genius." 

But Morris was now a favored guest in minis- 
terial, even more than in opposition circles; he 
was considered to belong to what the czar after- 
ward christened the "parti sain de I'Europe." 
He saw a good deal of both Pitt and Grenville, and 
was consulted by them not only about American, 
but also about European affairs ; and a number of 
favors which he asked for some of his friends 
among the emigres were granted. All his visits 
were not on business, however; as, for instance, 
on July 14: "Dine at Mr. Pitt's. We sit down 
at six. Lords Grenville, Chatham, and another 
come later. The rule is established for six pre- 
cisely, which is right, I think. The wines are 
good and the conversation flippant." Morris 
helped Grenville in a number of ways, at the Prus- 
sian court for instance ; and was even induced by 
him to write a letter to Washington, attempting 
to put the English attitude toward us in a good 



Stay in Europe 2S7 

light. Washington, however, was no more to be 
carried off his feet in favor of the EngHsh than 
against them ; and the facts he brought out in his 
reply showed that Morris had rather lost his poise, 
and had been hurried into an action that was ill 
advised. He was quite often at court ; and relates 
a conversation with the king, wherein that mon- 
arch's language seems to have been much such as 
tradition assigns him — short, abrupt sentences, 
repetitions, and the frequent use of "what." 

He also saw a good deal of the royalist refugees. 
Some of them he liked and was intimate with ; but 
the majority disgusted him and made him utterly 
impatient with their rancorous folly. He com- 
mented on the strange levity and wild negotiations 
of the Count d'Artois, and prophesied that his 
character was such as to make his projected at- 
tempt on La Vendee hopeless from the start. 
Another day he was at the Marquis de Spinola's : 
"The conversation here, where our company con- 
sists of aristocrats of the first feather, turns on 
French affairs. They, at first, agree that tmion 
among the French is necessary. But when they 
come to particulars, they fly off and are m.ad. 
Madame Spinola would send the Duke of Orleans 
to Siberia. An abbe, a young man, talks much 
and loud, to show his esprit; and to hear them 
one would suppose they were quite at their ease in 
a petit soiiper de Paris.'' Of that ponderous exile, 



288 Gouverneur Morris 

the chief of the House of Bourbon, and afterward 
Louis XVIII. he said that, in his opinion, he had 
nothing to do but to try to get shot, thereby- 
redeeming by valor the foregone follies of his 
conduct. 

In June, 1796, Morris returned to the Continent, 
and started on another tour, in his own carriage ; 
having spent some time himself in breaking in his 
young and restive horses to their task. He visited 
all the different capitals, at one time or another; 
among them, BerHn, where, as usual, he was very 
well received. For all his horror of Jacobinism, 
Morris was a thorough American, perfectly inde- 
pendent, without a particle of the snob in his dis- 
position, and valuing his acquaintances for what 
they were, not for their titles. In his diary he 
puts down the Queen of England as "a well-bred, 
sensible woman," and the Empress of Austria as 
"a good sort of little woman," and contemptu- 
ously dismisses the Prussian king with a word, 
precisely as he does with any one else. One of 
the entries in his journal, while he was staying in 
Berlin, offers a case in point. "July 23, I dine, 
very much against my will, with Prince Ferdinand. 
I was engaged to a very agreeable party, but it 
seems the highnesses must never be denied, unless 
it be from indisposition. I had, however, written 
a note declining the intended honor ; but the mes- 
senger, upon looking at it, for it was a letter patent, 



Stay in Europe 289 

like the invitation, said he could not deliver it; 
that nobody ever refused; all of which I was 
informed of after he was gone. On consulting I 
found that I must go or give mortal offense, which 
last I have no inclination to do ; so I write another 
note, and send out to hunt up the messenger. 
While I am abroad this untoward incident is 
arranged, and of course I am at Bellevue." While 
at court on one occasion he met, and took a great 
fancy to, the daughter of the famous Baroness 
Riedesel ; having been bom in the United States, 
she had been christened America. 

In one of his conversations with the king, who 
was timid and hesitating, Morris told him that the 
Austrians would be all right if he would only lend 
them some Prussian generals — a remark upon 
which Jena and Auerstadt later on offered a curi- 
ous commentary. He became very impatient with 
the king's inabiUty to make up his mind; and 
wrote to the Duchess of Cimiberland that "the 
guardian angel of the French Republic kept him 
lingering on this side of the grave." He wrote to 
Lord Grenville that Prussia was "seeking Httle 
things by little means," and that the war with 
Poland was popular "because the moral principles 
of a Prussian go to the possession of whatever he 
can acquire. And so little is he the slave of what 
he calls vulgar prejudice, that, give him oppor- 
tunity and means, and he will spare you the 
19 



290 Gouverneur Morris 

trouble of finding a pretext. This liberality of 
sentiment greatly facilitates negotiation, for it is 
not necessary to clothe propositions in honest and 
decent forms." Morris was a most startling 
phenomenon to the diplomatists of the day, 
trampling with utter disregard on all their heredi- 
tary theories of finesse and cautious duplicity. 
The timid formalists, and more especially those 
who considered double-dealing as the legitimate, 
and in fact the only legitimate, weapon of their 
trade, were displeased with him; but he was 
very highly thought of by such as could see the 
strength and originality of the views set forth in 
his frank, rather overbold language. 

At Dresden he notes that he was late on the day 
set down for his presentation at court, owing to 
his valet having translated halb zwolf as half -past 
twelve. The Dresden picture galleries were the 
first that drew from him any very strong expres- 
sions of admiration. In the city were numbers of 
the emigres, fleeing from their countrymen, and 
only permitted to stop in Saxony for a few days ; 
yet they were serene and gay, and spent their time 
in busy sight-seeing, examining everything curious 
which they could get at. Morris had become 
pretty well accustomed to the way in which they 
met fate ; but such lively resignation surprised even 
him, and he remarked that so great a calamity had 
never lighted on shoulders so well fitted to bear it. 



Stay in Europe 291 

At Vienna he made a long stay, not leaving it 
until January, 1797. Here, as usual, he frater- 
nized at once with the various diplomatists; the 
English ambassador. Sir Morton Eden, in particu- 
lar, going out of his way to show him every atten- 
tion. The Austrian prime minister, M. Thugut, 
was also very polite ; and so were the foreign min- 
isters of all the powers. He was soon at home in 
the upper social circles of this German Paris ; but 
from the entries in his journal it is evident that he 
thought very little of Viennese society. He liked 
talking and the company of brilliant conversation- 
alists, and he abominated gambling ; but in Vienna 
every one was so devoted to play that there was no 
conversation at all. He considered a dumb circle 
round a card-table as the dullest society in the 
world, and in Vienna there was little else. Nor 
was he impressed with the ability of the statesmen 
he met. He thought the Austrian nobles to be on 
the decline ; they stood for the dying feudal sys- 
tem. 

The great families had been squandering their 
riches with the most reckless extravagance, and 
were becoming broken and impoverished; and 
the imperial government was glad to see the humil- 
iation of the haughty nobles, not perceiving that, 
if preserved, they would act as a buffer between it 
and the new power beginning to make itself felt 
throughout Europe, and would save the throne if 



292 Gouverneur Morris 

not from total overthrow, at least from shocks so 
fierce as greatly to weaken it. 

Morris considered Prince Esterhazy as an arche- 
typical representative of the class. He was cap- 
tain of the noble Hiingarian Guard, a small body 
of tall, handsome men on fiery steeds, magnifi- 
cently caparisoned. The prince, as its com- 
mander, wore a Hungarian dress, scarlet, with 
fur cape and cuffs, and yellow morocco boots; 
everything embroidered with pearls, four htmdred 
and seventy large ones, and many thousand small, 
but all put on in good taste. He had a collar of 
large diamonds, a plume of diamonds in his cap; 
and his sword-hilt, scabbard, and spurs were inlaid 
with the same precious stones. His horse was 
equally be jeweled; steed and rider, with their 
trappings, "were estimated at a value of a quarter 
of a million dollars." Old Bliicher would surely 
have considered the pair "very fine plunder." 

The prince was reported to be nominally the 
richest subject in Europe, with a revenue that 
during the Turkish war went up to a million 
guilders annually; yet he was hopelessly in debt 
already, and getting deeper every year. He lived 
in great magnificence, but was by no means noted 
for lavish hospitality; all his extravagance was 
reserved for himself, especially for purposes of 
display. His Vienna stable contained a himdred 
and fifty horses ; and during a six weeks' residence 



I 






Stay in Europe 293 

in Frankfort, where he was ambassador at the 
time of an imperial coronation, he spent eighty 
thousand poimds. Altogether, an outsider may- 
be pardoned for not at first seeing precisely what 
useful function such a merely gorgeous being per- 
formed in the body politic ; yet when summoned 
before the bar of the new world-forces, Esterhazy 
and his kind showed that birds of such fine feathers 
sometimes had beaks and talons as well, and knew 
how to use them, the craven flight of the French 
noblesse to the contrary notwithstanding. 

Morris was often at court, where the constant 
theme of conversation was naturally the struggle 
with the French armies under Moreau and Bona- 
parte. After one of these mornings he mentions : 
" The levee was oddly arranged, all the males being 
in one apartment, through which the emperor 
passes in going to chapel, and returns the same 
way with the empress and imperial family ; after 
which they go through their own rooms to the 
ladies assembled on the other side." 

The English members of the corps diplomatique 
in all the European capitals were especially civil 
to him ; and he liked them more than their conti- 
nental brethren. But for some of their yoimg 
tourist countrymen he cared less ; and it is curious 
to see that the ridicule to which Americans have 
rightly exposed themselves by their absurd fond- 
ness for imiforms and for assimiing military titles 



294 Gouverneur Morris 

to which they have no warrant, was no less 
deservedly earned by the English at the end of 
the last century. One of Morris's friends, Baron 
Groshlaer, being, like the other Viennese, curious 
to know the object of his stay, — they guessed 
aright that he wished to get Lafayette liberated, — 
at last almost asked him outright about it, 
"Finally I tell him that the only difference 
between me and the young Englishmen, of whom 
there is a swarm here, is, that I seek instruction 
with gray hairs and they with brown, , , , At the 
archduchess's one of the little princes, brother to 
the emperor, and who is truly an arch-duke, asks 
me to explain to him the different uniforms worn 
by the young English, of whom there are a great 
number here, all in regimentals. Some of these 
belong to no corps at all, and the others to yeo- 
manry, fencibles, and the like, all of which pur- 
port to be raised for the defense of their country 
in case she should be invaded ; but now, when the 
invasion seems most imminent, they are abroad, 
and cannot be made to feel the ridiculous inde- 
cency of appearing in regimentals. Sir M, Eden 
and others have given them the broadest hints 
without the least effect. One of them told me 
that all the world should not laugh him out of his 
regimentals, I bowed. , , . I tell the prince that 
I really am not able to answer his question, but 
that, in general, their dresses I believe are worn 



Stay in Europe 295 

for convenience in traveling. He smiles at this. 
... If I were an Englishman I should be hurt at 
these exhibitions, and as it is I am sorry for them. 
... I find that here they assume it as xinques- 
tionable that the young men of England have a 
right to adjust the ceremonial of Vienna, The 
political relations of the two countries induce the 
good company here to treat them with politeness ; 
but nothing prevents their being laughed at, as I 
found the other evening at Madame de Grosh- 
laer's, where the young women as well as the girls 
were very merry at the expense of these yoimg 
men." 

After leaving Vienna he again passed through 
Berlin, and in a conversation with the king he 
foreshadowed curiously the state of politics a cen- 
tury later, and showed that he thoroughly appre- 
ciated the cause that would in the end reconcile 
the traditional enmity of the Hohenzollems and 
Hapsburgs. "After some trifling things I tell him 
that I have just seen his best friend. He asks 
who? and, to his great surprise, I reply, the em- 
peror. He speaks of him well personally, and I 
observe that he is a very honest young man, to 
which his majesty replies by asking, ' Mais, que 
pensez vous de Thugut.' 'Quant a cela, c'est 
•une autre affaire, sire.' I had stated the interest, 
which makes him and the emperor good friends, 
to be their mutual apprehensions from Russia. 



296 Gouverneur Morris 

'But suppose we all three unite?' *Ce sera un 
diable de fricassee, sire, si vous vous mettez tous 
les trois k casser les oeufs.' " 

At Brunswick he was received with great hos- 
pitality, the duke, and particularly the duchess 
dowager, the King of England's sister, treating 
him very hospitably. He here saw General Riede- 
sel, with whom he was most friendly ; the general 
in the course of conversation inveighed bitterly 
against Burgoyne. He went to Mimich also, where 
he was received on a very intimate footing by 
Count Rimiford, then the great power in Bavaria, 
who was busily engaged in doing all he could to 
better the condition of his country, Morris was 
much interested in his reforms. They were cer- 
tainly needed; the cotmt told his friend that on 
assuming the reins of power the abuses to be 
remedied were beyond belief — for instance, there 
was one regiment of cavalry that had five field 
officers and only three horses. With some of the 
friends that Morris made — such as the Duchess 
of Cimiberland, the Princesse de la Tour et Taxis 
and others — ^he corresponded until the end of his 

life. 

While at Vienna he again did all he could to 
get Lafayette released from prison, where his wife 
was confined with him ; but in vain. Madame de 
Lafayette's sister, the Marquise de Montagu, and 
Madame de Stael, both wrote him the most urgent 



Stay in Europe 297 

appeals to do what he could for the prisoners ; the 
former writing: "My sister is in danger of losing 
the life you saved in the prisons of Paris . . . has 
not he whom Europe numbers among those citi- 
zens of whom North America ought to be most 
proud, has not he the right to make himself heard 
in favor of a citizen of the United States, and of a 
wife, whose life belongs to him, since he has pre- 
served it ? " Madame de Stael felt the most genu- 
ine grief for Lafayette, and very sincere respect 
for Morris ; and in her letters to the latter she dis- 
played both sentiments with a lavish exaggeration 
that hardly seems in good taste. If Morris had 
needed a spur the letters would have supplied it ; 
but the task was an impossible one, and Lafayette 
was not released tmtil the peace in 1797, when he 
was turned over to the American consul at Ham- 
burg, in Morris's presence. 

Morris was able to render more effectual help to 
an individual far less worthy of it than Lafayette. 
This was the then Duke of Orleans, afterward 
King Louis Philippe, who had fled from France 
with Dumouriez. Morris's old friend, Madame de 
Flahaut, appealed to him almost hysterically on 
the duke's behalf ; and he at once did even more 
than she requested, giving the duke money where- 
with to go to America, and also furnishing him 
with imlimited credit at his own New York 
banker's, during his wanderings in the United 



298 Gouverneur Morris 

States. This was done for the sake of the Duchess 
of Orleans, to whom Morris was devotedly at- 
tached, not for the sake of the duke himself. The 
latter knew this perfectly, writing: "Your kind- 
ness is a blessing I owe to my mother and to our 
friend" (Madame de Flahaut). The bourgeois 
king admirably represented the meanest, smallest 
side of the bourgeois character ; he was not a bad 
man, but he was a very petty and contemptible 
one; had he been bom in a different station of 
life, he would have been just the individual to take 
a prominent part in local temperance meetings, 
while he sanded the sugar he sold in his comer 
grocery. His treatment of Morris's loan was 
characteristic. When he came into his rights 
again, at the Restoration, he at first appeared 
to forget his debt entirely, and when his memory 
was jogged, he merely sent Morris the original 
sirni, without a word of thanks ; whereupon Mor- 
ris, rather nettled, and as prompt to stand up for 
his rights against a man in prosperity as he had 
been to help him when in adversity, put the 
matter in the hands of his lawyer, through whom 
he notified Louis Philippe that if the affair was to 
be treated on a merely business basis, it should 
then be treated in a strictly business way, and the 
interest for the twenty years that had gone by 
should be forwarded also. This was accordingly 
done, although not tmtil after Morris's death, the 



Stay in Europe 299 

entire sum refiinded being seventy thousand 
francs. 

Morris brought his compHcated business affairs 
in Europe to a close in 1 798, and sailed from Ham- 
burg on October 4 of that year, reaching New 
York after an exceedingly tedious and disagree- 
able voyage of eighty days. 



CHAPTER XII. 

SERVICE IN THE UNITED STATES SENATE. 



M' 



ORRIS was very warmly greeted on his 
return; and it was evident that the 
length of his stay abroad had in nowise 
made him lose ground with his friends at home. 
His natural affiliations were all with the Federalist 
party, which he immediately joined. 

During the year 1799 he did not take much 
part in politics, as he was occupied in getting his 
business affairs in order and in putting to rights 
his estates at Morrisania. The old manor-house 
had become such a crazy, leaky affair that he tore 
it down and built a new one ; a great, roomy build- 
ing, not in the least showy, but solid, comfortable, 
and in perfect taste ; having, across the tree-clad 
hills of Westchester, a superb view of the Soimd, 
with its jagged coast and capes and islands. 

Although it was so long since he had practised 
law, he was shortly engaged in a very important 
case that was argued for eight days before the 
Court of Errors in Albany. Few trials in the 
State of New York have ever brought together 
such a number of men of remarkable legal ability ; 
for among the lawyers engaged on one side or the 
other were Morris, Hamilton, Burr, Robert Living- 

300 



In the United States Senate 301 

ston, and Troup. There were some sharp passages 
of arms : and the trial of wits between Morris and 
Hamilton in particular was so keen as to cause a 
passing coolness. 

During the ten years that had gone by since 
Morris sailed for Europe, the control of the na- 
tional government had been in the hands of the 
Federalists; when he returned, party bitterness 
was at the highest pitch, for the Democrats were 
preparing to make the final push for power which 
should overthrow and ruin their antagonists. 
Four-fifths of the talent, ability, and good sense 
of the country were to be found in the Federalist 
ranks; for the Federalists had held their own so 
far, by sheer force of courage and intellectual vigor, 
over foes in reality more numerous. Their great 
prop had been Washington. His colossal influ- 
ence was to the end decisive in party contests, and 
he had in fact, although hardly in name, almost 
entirely abandoned his early attempts at non- 
partisanship, had grown to distrust Madison as 
he long before had distrusted Jefferson, and 
had come into constantly closer relations with 
their enemies. His death diminished greatly the 
chances of Federalist success; there were two 
other causes at work that destroyed them entirely. 

One of these was the very presence in the domi- 
nant party of so many men nearly equal in strong 
will and great intellectual power ; their ambitions 



302 Gouverneur Morris 

and theories clashed; even the loftiness of their 
aims, and their disdain of everything small, made 
them poor politicians, and with Washington out of 
the way there was no one commander to overawe 
the rest and to keep down the fierce bickerings 
constantly arising among them ; while in the other 
party there was a single leader, Jefferson, abso- 
lutely without a rival, but supported by a host of 
sharp political workers, most skilful in marshaling 
that unwieldy and hitherto disunited host of voters 
who were inferior in intelligence to their fellows. 

The second cause lay deep in the nature of the 
Federalist organization: it was its distrust of the 
people. This was the fatally weak streak in Fed- 
eralism. In a government such as ours it was a 
foregone conclusion that a party which did not 
believe in the people would sooner or later be 
thrown from power unless there was an armed 
break-up of the system. The distrust was felt, 
and of course excited corresponding and intense 
hostility. Had the Federalists been united, and 
had they freely trusted in the people, the latter 
would have shown that the trust was well founded ; 
but there was no hope for leaders who suspected 
each other and feared their followers. 

Morris landed just as the Federalist reaction, 
brought about by the conduct of France, had spent 
itself, — thanks partly to some inopportime pieces 
of insolence from England, in which country, as 



In the United States Senate 303 

Morris once wrote to a foreign friend, "on a tou- 
jours le bon esprit de vouloir prendre les mouches 
avec du vinaigre." The famous Alien and Sedi- 
tion laws were exciting great disgust and, in Vir- 
ginia and Kentucky Jefferson was using them as 
handles wherewith to guide seditious agitation — 
not that he believed in sedition, but because he 
considered it good party policy, for the moment, 
to excite it. The parties hated each other with 
rancorous virulence ; the newspapers teemed with 
the foulest abuse of public men, accusations of 
financial dishonesty were rife, Washington him- 
self not being spared, and the most scurrilous per- 
sonalities were bandied about between the different 
editors. The Federalists were split into two 
factions, one following the President, Adams, in 
his efforts to keep peace with France, if it could 
be done with honor, while the others, under 
Hamilton's lead, wished war at once. 

Pennsylvanian politics were already very low. 
The leaders who had taken control were men of 
mean capacity and small morality, and the State 
was not only becoming rapidly democratic but was 
also drifting along in a disorganized, pseudo-jaco- 
binical, half insurrectionary kind of way that 
would have boded ill for its future had it not been 
fettered by the presence of healthier communities 
roimd about it. New England was the only part 
of the commimity, excepting Delaware, where 



304 Gouverneur Morris 

Federalism was on a perfectly sound footing; for 
in that section there was no caste spirit, the leaders 
and their followers were thoroughly in touch, and 
all the citizens, shrewd, thrifty, independent, were 
used to self-government, and fully awake to the 
fact that honesty and order are the prerequisites of 
liberty. Yet even here Democracy had made 
some inroads. 

South of the Potomac the Federalists had lost 
ground rapidly. Virginia was still a battlefield; 
as long as Washington lived, his tremendous per- 
sonal influence acted as a brake on the democratic 
advance, and the State's greatest orator, Patrick 
Henry, had halted beside the grave to denounce 
the seditious schemes of the disunion agitators 
with the same burning, thrilling eloquence that, 
thirty years before, had stirred to their depths the 
hearts of his hearers when he bade defiance to the 
tyrannous might of the British king. But when 
these two men were dead, Marshall, — though des- 
tined, as chief and controlling influence in the 
third division of our governmental system, to 
mold the whole of that system on the lines of 
Federalist thought, and to prove that a sound 
judiciary could largely affect an unsound execu- 
tive and legislature, — even Marshall could not, 
single-handed, stem the current that had grad- 
ually gathered head. Virginia stands easily first 
among all our commonwealths for the statesmen 



In the United States Senate 305 

and warriors she has brought forth ; and it is note- 
worthy that during the long contest between the 
nationalists and separatists, which forms the cen- 
tral fact in our history for the first three-quarters 
of a century of our national life, she gave leaders 
to both sides at the two great crises : Washington 
and Marshall to the one, and Jefferson to the other, 
when the question was one of opinion as to whether 
the Union should be built up ; and when the appeal 
to arms was made to tear it down, Farragut and 
Thomas to the north, Lee and Jackson to the 
south. 

There was one eddy in the tide of democratic 
success that flowed so strongly to the southward. 
This was in South Carolina. The fierce little Pal- 
metto State has always been a free lance among 
her Southern sisters ; for instance, though usually 
ultra-democratic, she was hostile to the two great 
democratic chiefs, Jefferson and Jackson, though 
both were from the South. At the time that 
Morris came home, the brilliant little group of 
Federalist leaders within her bounds, headed by 
men of national renown like Pinckney and Harper, 
kept her true to Federalism by downright force of 
intellect and integrity ; for they were among the 
purest as well as the ablest statesmen of the day. 

New York had been going through a series of 
bitter party contests ; any one examining a file of 
papers of that day will come to the conclusion that 
20 



3o6 Gouverneur Morris 

party spirit was even more violent and unreason- 
able then than now. The two great Federalist 
leaders, Hamilton and Jay, stood head and shoul- 
ders above all their democratic competitors, and 
they were backed by the best men in the State, 
like Rufus King, Schuyler, and others. But, 
though as orators and statesmen they had no 
rivals, they were very deficient in the arts 
of political management. Hamilton's imperious 
haughtiness had alienated the powerful family 
of the Livingstons, who had thrown in their lot 
with the Clintonians; and a still more valuable 
ally to the latter had arisen in that consummate 
master of "machine" politics, Aaron Burr. In 
1792, Jay, then chief justice of the United States, 
had nm for governor against Clinton, and had 
received the majority of the votes ; but had been 
counted out by the returning board in spite of the 
protest of its four Federalist members — Ganse- 
voort, Roosevelt, Jones, and Sands. The indigna- 
tion was extreme, and only Jay's patriotism and 
good sense prevented an outbreak. However, the 
memory of the fraud remained fresh in the minds 
of the citizens, and at the next election for gov- 
ernor he was chosen by a heavy majority, having 
then just come back from his mission to England. 
Soon afterward his treaty was published, and 
excited a whirlwind of indignation; it was only 
ratified in the Senate through Washington's great 



In the United States Senate 307 

influence, backed by the magnificent oratory of 
Fisher Ames, whose speech on this occasion, when 
he was almost literally on his death-bed, ranks 
among the half-dozen greatest of our country. 
The treaty was very objectionable in certain 
points, but it was most necessary to our well-being, 
and Jay was probably the only American who 
could have negotiated it. As with the Ashburton 
treaty many years later, extreme sections in Eng- 
land attacked it as fiercely as did the extreme 
sections here; and Lord Sheffield voiced their 
feelings when he hailed the War of 181 2 as offering 
a chance to England to get back the advantages 
out of which "Jay had duped Grenville." 

But the clash with France shortly afterward 
swept away the recollection of the treaty, and Jay 
was reelected in 1798. One of the arguments, by 
the way, which was used against him in the can- 
vass was that he was an abolitionist. But, in 
spite of his reelection, the New York Democrats 
were steadily gaining groimd. 

Such was the situation when Morris returned. 
He at once took high rank among the Federalists, 
and in April, 1800, just before the final wreck of 
their party, was chosen by them to fill an unex- 
pired term of three years in the United States 
Senate. Before this he had made it evident that 
his sympathies lay with Hamilton and those who 
did not think highly of Adams. He did not deem 



3o8 Gouverneur Morris 

it wise to renominate the latter for the presidency. 
He had even written to Washington, earnestly 
beseeching him to accept the nomination; but 
Washington died a day or two after the letter was 
sent. In spite of the jarring between the leaders, 
the Federalists nominated Adams and Pinckney. 
In the ensuing presidential election many of the 
party chiefs, notably Marshall of Virginia, already 
a strong Adams man, faithfully stood by the ticket 
in its entirety; but Hamilton, Morris, and many 
others at the North probably hoped in their hearts 
that, by the aid of the curious electoral system 
which then existed, some chance would put the 
great Carolinian in the first place and make him 
president. Indeed, there is little question that 
this might have been done, had not Pinckney, one of 
the most high-minded and disinterested statesmen 
we have ever had, emphatically declined to profit 
in any way by the hurting of the grim old Puritan. 
The house thus divided against itself naturally 
fell, and Jefferson was chosen president. It was 
in New York that the decisive struggle took place, 
for that was the pivotal State; and there the 
Democrats, imder the lead of the Livingstons and 
Clintons, but above all by the masterly political 
maneuvers of Aaron Burr, gained a crushing vic- 
tory. Hamilton, stimg to madness by the defeat, 
and sincerely believing that the success of his 
opponents would be fatal to the republic, — for 



In the United States Senate 309 

the two parties hated each other with a blind fury 
unknown to the organizations of the present 
day, — actually proposed to Jay, the governor, 
to nullify the action of the people by the aid of 
the old legislature, a Federalist body, which was 
still holding over, although the members of its 
successor had been chosen. Jay, as pure as he 
was brave, refused to sanction any such scheme 
of imworthy partisanship. It is worth noting 
that the victors in this election introduced for the 
first time the " spoils system," in all its rigor, into 
our state affairs; imitating the bad example of 
Pennsylvania a year or two previously. 

When the Federalists in Congress, into which 
body the choice for president had been thrown, 
took up Burr, as a less objectionable alternative 
than Jefferson, Morris, much to his credit, openly 
and heartily disapproved of the movement, and 
was sincerely glad that it failed. For he thought 
Burr far the more dangerous man of the two, and, 
moreover, did not believe that the evident inten- 
tion of the people should be thwarted. Both he 
and Hamilton, on this occasion, acted more wisely 
and more honestly than did most of their heated 
fellow partisans. Writing to the latter, the former 
remarked: "It is dangerous to be impartial in 
politics ; you, who are temperate in drinking, have 
never perhaps noticed the awkward situation of a 
man who continues sober after the company are 



3IO Gouverneur Morris 

drunk." Morris joined the Senate at Philadelphia 
in May, 1800, but it almost immediately adjourned, 
to meet at Washington in November, when he was 
again present. Washington, as it then was, was a 
place whose straggling squalor has often been de- 
scribed. Morris wrote to the Princesse de la Tour 
et Taxis, that it needed nothing "but houses, cel- 
lars, kitchens, well-informed men, amiable women, 
and other little trifles of the kind to make the city 
perfect;" that it was "the very best city in the 
world for a future residence," but that as he was 
"not one of those good people whom we call pos- 
terity," he would meanwhile like to live some- 
where else. 

During his three years' term in the Senate he 
was one of the strong pillars of the Federalist 
party ; but he was both too independent and too 
erratic to act always within strict party lines, and 
while he was an ultra-Federalist on some points, 
he openly abandoned his fellows on others. He 
despised Jefferson as a tricky and incapable 
theorist, skilful in getting votes, but in nothing 
else; a man who believed "in the wisdom of 
mobs, and the moderation of Jacobins," and who 
found himself "in the wretched plight of being 
forced to turn out good officers to make room for 
the unworthy." 

After the election that turned them out of 
power, but just before their opponents took office, 






In the United States Senate 311 

the Federalists in the Senate and House passed the 
famous judiciary bill, and Adams signed it. It 
provided for a number of new federal judges to act 
throughout the States, while the Supreme Court 
was retained as the ultimate court of decision. It 
was an excellent measure, inasmuch as it simpli- 
fied the work of the judiciary, saved the highest 
branch from useless traveling, prevented the cal- 
endars from being choked with work, and supplied 
an upright federal judiciary to certain districts 
where the local judges could not be depended upon 
to act honestly. On the other hand, the Federal- 
ists employed it as a means to keep themselves 
partly in power, after the nation had decided that 
they should be turned out. Although the Demo- 
crats had bitterly opposed it, yet if, as was only 
right, the offices created by it had been left vacant 
until Jefferson came in, it would probably have 
been allowed to stand. But Adams, most im- 
properly, spent the last hours of his administra- 
tion in putting in the new judges. 

Morris, who heartily championed the measure, 
wrote his reasons for so doing to Livingston; 
giving, with his usual frankness, those that were 
political and improper, as well as those based on 
some public policy, but apparentl}^ not appre- 
ciating the gravity of the charges he so lightly 
admitted. He said : "The new judiciary bill may 
have, and doubtless has, many little faults, but it 



312 Gouverneur Morris 

answers the double purpose of bringing justice 
near to men's doors, and of giving additional fiber 
to the root of government. You must not, my 
friend, judge of other States by your own. De- 
pend on it, that in some parts of this Union justice 
cannot be readily obtained in the state courts." 
So far, he was all right, and the truth of his state- 
ments, and the soundness of his reasons, could 
not be challenged as to the propriety of the law 
itself; but he was much less happy in giving his 
views of the way in which it would be carried out : 
"That the leaders of the Federal party may use 
this opportimity to provide for friends and ad- 
herents is, I think, probable ; and if they were my 
enemies, I should blame them for it. Whether 
I should do the same thing myself is another ques- 
tion. . . . They are about to experience a heavy- 
gale of adverse wind; can they be blamed for 
casting many anchors to hold their ship through 
the storm?" Most certainly they should be 
blamed for casting this particular kind of anchor ; 
it was a very gross outrage for them to "provide 
for friends and adherents" in such a manner. 

The folly of their action was seen at once; for 
they had so maddened the Democrats that the 
latter repealed the act as soon as they came into 
power. This also was of course all wrong, and 
was a simple sacrifice of a measure of good gov- 
ernment to partisan rage. Morris led the fight 



In the United States Senate 313 

against it, deeming the repeal not only in the 
highest degree unwise but also unconstitutional. 
After the repeal was accomplished, the knowledge 
that their greed to grasp office under the act was 
probably the cause of the loss of an excellent law, 
must have been rather a bitter cud for the Federal- 
ists to chew. Morris always took an exaggerated 
view of the repeal, regarding it as a death-blow to 
the Constitution. It was certainly a most unfor- 
tunate affair throughout ; and much of the blame 
attaches to the Federalists, although still more to 
their antagonists. 

The absolute terror with which even moderate 
Federalists had viewed the victory of the Demo- 
crats was in a certain sense justifiable; for the 
leaders who led the Democrats to triumph were 
the very men who had fought tooth and nail 
against every measure necessary to make us a free, 
orderly, and powerful nation. But the safety of 
the nation really lay in the very fact that the 
policy hitherto advocated by the now victorious 
party had embodied principles so wholly absurd 
in practice that it was out of the question to apply 
them at all to the actual running of the govern- 
ment. Jefferson could write or speak — and could 
feel too — the most high-sounding sentiments ; but 
once it came to actions he was absolutely at sea, 
and on almost every matter — especially where he 
did well — he had to fall back on the Federalist 



314 Gouverneur Morris 

theories. Almost the only important point on 
which he allowed himself free scope was that of 
the national defenses; and here, particulariy as 
regards the navy, he worked very serious harm 
to the country. Otherwise he generally adopted 
and acted on the views of his predecessors; 
as Morris said, the Democrats "did more to 
strengthen the executive than Federalists dared 
think of, even in Washington's day." As a conse- 
quence, though the nation would certainly have 
been better off if men like Adams or Pinckney 
had been retained at the head of affairs, yet the 
change resulted in far less harm than it bade 
fair to. 

On the other hand the Federalists cut a very 
sorry figure in opposition. We have never had 
another party so little able to stand adversity. 
They lost their temper first and they lost their 
principles next, and actually began to take up 
the heresies discarded by their adversaries. Mor- 
ris himself, imtrue to all his previous record, 
advanced various States'-rights doctrines; and 
the Federalists, the men who had created the 
Union, ended their days tmder the grave sus- 
picion of having desired to break it up. Morris 
even opposed, and on a close vote temporarily 
defeated, the perfectly imobjectionable proposi- 
tion to change the electoral system by designating 
the candidates for president and vice-president; 






:i4tf'. 



'11 



In the United States Senate 315 

the reason he gave was that he believed parties 
should be forced to nominate both of their best 
men, and that he regarded the Jefferson-Burr tie 
as a beautiful object-lesson for teaching this point. 

On one most important question, however, he 
cut loose from his party, who were entirely in the 
wrong, and acted with the administration, who 
were behaving in strict accordance with Federalist 
precepts. This was in reference to the treaty by 
which we acquired Louisiana. 

While in opposition, one of the most discredit- 
able features of the Republican-Democratic party 
had been its servile truckling to France, which at 
times drove it into open disloyalty to America. 
Indeed, this subservience to foreigners was a 
feature of our early party history; and the most 
confirmed pessimist must admit that, as regards 
patriotism and indignant intolerance of foreign 
control, the party organizations of to-day are im- 
measurably superior to those of eighty or ninety 
years back. But it was only while in opposition 
that either party was ready to throw itself into 
the arms of outsiders. Once the Democrats took 
the reins they immediately changed their attitude. 
The West demanded New Orleans and the valley 
of the Mississippi ; and what it demanded it was 
determined to get. When we only had the decay- 
ing weakness of Spain to deal with, there was no 
cause for hurry ; but when Louisiana was ceded to 



31 6 Gouverneur Morris 

France, at the time when the empire of Napoleon 
was a match for all the rest of the world put 
together, the country was up in arms at once. 

The administration promptly began to negotiate 
for the purchase of Louisiana. Morris backed 
them up heartily, thus splitting off from the bulk 
of the Federalists, and earnestly advocated far 
stronger measures than had been taken. He be- 
lieved that so soon as the French should establish 
themselves in New Orleans we should have a war 
with them; he knew it would be impossible for 
the haughty chiefs of a military despotism long 
to avoid collisions with the reckless and warlike 
backwoodsmen of the border. Nor would he have 
been sorry had such a war taken place. He said 
that it was a necessity to us, for we were dwindling 
into a race of mere speculators and driveling 
philosophers, whereas ten years of warfare would 
bring forth a crop of heroes and statesmen, fit 
timber out of which to hew an empire. 

Almost his last act in the United States Senate 
was to make a most powerful and telling speech in 
favor of at once occupying the territory in dispute, 
and bidding defiance to Napoleon. He showed 
that we could not submit to having so dangerous 
a neighbor as France, an ambitious and conquer- 
ing nation, at whose head was the greatest warrior 
of the age. With ringing emphasis he claimed 
the western regions as peculiarly our heritage, as 



In the United States Senate 317 

the property of the fathers of America which they 
held in trust for their children. It was true that 
France was then enjoying the peace which she had 
wrung from the gathered armies of all Europe; 
yet he advised us to fling down the gauntlet fear- 
lessly, not hampering ourselves by an attempt at 
alliance with Great Britain or any other power, 
but resting confident that, if America was heartily 
in earnest, she would be able to hold her own in 
any struggle. The cost of the conquest he brushed 
contemptuously aside ; he considered " that coimt- 
ing-house policy, which sees nothing but money, a 
poor, short-sighted, half-witted, mean, and miser- 
able thing, as far removed from wisdom as is a 
monkey from a man." He wished for peace ; but 
he did not believe the emperor would yield us the 
territory, and he knew that his fellow representa- 
tives, and practically all the American people, 
were determined to fight for it if they could get 
it in no other way ; therefore he advised them to 
begin at once, and gain forthwith what they 
wanted, and perhaps their example would inspirit 
Europe to rise against the tyrant. 

It was bold advice, and if need had arisen it 
would have been followed ; for we were boxind to 
have Louisiana, if not by bargain and sale then by 
fair shock of arms. But Napoleon yielded, and 
gave us the land for fifteen millions, of which, said 
Morris, " I am content to pay my share to deprive 



3i8 Gouverneur Morris 

foreigners of all pretext for entering our interior 
country ; if nothing else were gained by the treaty, 
that alone would satisfy me." 

Morris's term as senator expired on March 4, 
1803, and he was not reelected; for New York 
State had passed into the hands of the Democrats. 
But he still continued to play a prominent part in 
public affairs, for he was the leader in starting the 
project of the Erie Canal. It was to him that we 
owe the original idea of this great waterway, for 
he thought of it and planned it out long before any 
one else. He had publicly proposed it during the 
Revolutionary period ; in 1803 he began the agita- 
tion in its favor that culminated in its realization, 
and he was chairman of the canal commissioners 
from the time of their appointment, in 18 10, until 
within a few months of his death. The first three 
reports of the commission were all from his pen. 
As Stephen Van Rensselaer, himself one of the 
commissioners from the beginning, said, "Gouver- 
neur Morris was the father of our great canal." 
He hoped ultimately to make it a ship canal. 
While a member of the commission, he not only 
discharged his duties as such with characteristic 
energy and painstaking, but he also did most 
effective outside work in advancing the enterprise, 
while he mastered the subject more thoroughly 
in all its details than did any other man. 

He spent most of his time at Morrisania, but 



In the United States Senate 319 

traveled for two or three months every summer, 
sometimes going out to the then "far West," along 
the shores of Lakes Erie and Ontario, and once 
descending the St. Lawrence. At home he spent 
his time tilling his farm, reading, receiving visits 
from his friends, and carrying on a wide corre- 
spondence on business and politics. Jay's home 
was within driving distance, and the two fine old 
fellows saw much of each other. On the 25th of 
December, 1809, Morris, then fifty-six years old, 
married Miss Anne Gary Randolph, a member of 
the famous Virginia family; he was very happy 
with her, and by her he had one son. Three 
weeks after the marriage he wrote Jay a pressing 
request to visit him: " I pray you will, with your 
daughters, embark immediately in your sleigh, 
after a very early breakfast, and push on so as to 
reach this house in the evening. My wife sends 
her love, and says she longs to receive her hus- 
band's friend ; that his sickness must be no excuse, 
for she will nurse him. Come, then, and see your 
old friend perform his part in an old-fashioned 
scene of domestic enjoyment." Jay was very 
simple in his way of living ; but Morris was rather 
formal. When he visited his friend he always came 
with his valet, was shown straight to his room 
without seeing any one, dressed himself with scrup- 
ulous nicety — being very particular about his pow- 
dered hair, — and then came down to see his host. 



320 Gouverneur Morris 

Although his letters generally dealt with public 
matters, he sometimes went into home details. 
He thus wrote an amusing letter to a good friend 
of his, a lady, who was desirous, following the 
custom of the day, to send her boy to what was 
called a "college" at an absurdly early age; he 
closed by warning her that "these children of 
eleven, after a four years' course, in which they 
may learn to smatter a little of everything, become 
bachelors of arts before they know how to button 
their clothes, and are the most troublesome and 
useless, sometimes the most pernicious, little 
animals that ever infested a commonwealth." 

At one time he received as his guest Moreau, the 
exiled French general, then seeking service in the 
United States. Writing in his diary an accoiint of 
the visit, he says : " In the course of our conversa- 
tion, touching very gently the idea of his serving 
(in case of necessity) against France, he declares 
frankly that, when the occasion arrives, he shall 
feel no reluctance; that France having cast him 
out, he is a citizen of the coimtry where he lives, 
and has the same right to follow his trade here as 
any other man." 

He took the keenest pleasure in his life, and 
always insisted that America was the pleasantest 
of all places in which to live. Writing to a friend 
abroad, and mentioning that he respected the 
people of Britain, but did not find them con- 



In the United States Senate 321 

genial, he added: " But were the manners of those 
countries as pleasant as the people are respectable, 
I should never be reconciled to their summers. 
Compare the uninterrupted warmth and splendor 
of America, from the first of May to the last of 
September, and her autumn, truly celestial, with 
your shivering June, your July and August some- 
times warm but often wet, your uncertain Sep- 
tember, your gloomy October, and your dismal 
November. Compare these things, and then say 
how a man who prizes the charm of Nature can 
think of making the exchange. If you were to 
pass one autumn with us, you would not give it 
for the best six months to be foimd in any other 
country. . . . There is a brilliance in our atmos- 
phere of which you can have no idea." 

He thoroughly appreciated the marvelous 
future that lay before the race on this continent. 
Writing in 1801, he says: "As yet we only crawl 
along the outer shell of our country. The in- 
terior excels the part we inhabit in soil, in climate, 
in everything. The proudest empire in Europe 
is but a bauble compared to what America ivill 
be, must be, in the course of two centuries, per- 
haps of one!" And again, "With respect to this 
country, calculation outruns fancy, and fact out- 
rims calculation." 

Until his hasty, impulsive temper became so 
soured by partisanship as to warp his judgment, 
21 



322 Gouverneur Morris 

Morris remained as well satisfied with the people 
and the system of government as with the land 
itself. In one of his first letters after his return 
to America he wrote: "There is a fimd of good 
sense and calmness of character here, which will, 
I think, avoid all dangerous excesses. We are 
free : we know it : and we know how to continue 
free." On another occasion, about the same 
time, he said: ''Nil desperandum de repuhlica is 
a soimd principle," Again, in the middle of Jef- 
ferson's first term: "We have indeed a set of 
madmen in the administration, and they will do 
many foolish thiags; but there is a vigorous 
vegetative principle at the root which will make 
our tree flourish, let the winds blow as they may." 
He at first took an equally just view of our 
political system, saying that in adopting a republi- 
can form of government he "not only took it, as 
a man does his wife, for better or worse, but, what 
few men do with their wives, knowing all its bad 
qualities." He observed that there was always a 
counter current in human affairs, which opposed 
alike good and evil. "Thus the good we hope is 
seldom attained, and the evil we fear is rarely 
realized. The leaders of faction must for their 
own sakes avoid errors of enormous magnitude ; so 
that, while the republican form lasts, we shall be 
fairly well governed." He thought this form the 
one best suited for us, and remarked that "every 



In the United States Senate 323 

kind of government was liable to evil; that the 
best was that which had fewest faults; that the 
excellence even of that best depended more on its 
fitness for the nation where it was established than 
on intrinsic perfection." He denounced, with a 
fierce scorn that they richly merit, the despicable 
demagogues and witless fools who teach that in all 
cases the voice of the majority must be implicitly 
obeyed, and that public men have only to carry 
out its will, and thus "acknowledge themselves 
the willing instruments of folly and vice. They 
declare that in order to please the people they 
will, regardless alike of what conscience may dic- 
tate or reason approve, make the profligate sacri- 
fice of public right on the altar of private interest. 
What more can be asked by the sternest tyrant of 
the most despicable slave? Creatures of this sort 
are the tools which usurpers employ in building 
despotism." 

Sounder and truer maxims never were uttered ; 
but unfortimately the indignation naturally ex- 
cited by the utter weakness and folly of Jefferson's 
second term, and the pitiable incompetence shown 
both by him, by his successor, and by their party 
associates in dealing with affairs, so inflamed and 
exasperated Morris as to make him completely 
lose his head, and hurried him into an opposition 
so violent that his follies surpassed the worst of 
the follies he condemned. He gradually lost faith 



m» 



324 Gouverneur Morris 

in our republican system, and in the Union itself. 
His old jealousy of the West revived more strongly 
than ever ; he actually proposed that our enormous 
masses of new territory, destined one day to hold 
the bulk of our population, "should be governed 
as provinces, and allowed no voice in our coiincils." 
So hopelessly futile a scheme is beneath comment ; 
and it cannot possibly be reconciled with his pre- 
vious utterances when he descanted on our future 
greatness as a people, and claimed the West as the 
heritage of our children. His conduct can only 
be imqualifiedly condemned ; and he has but the 
poor palliation that, in our early history, many of 
the leading men in New York, and an even larger 
proportion in New England, felt the same narrow, 
illiberal jealousy of the West which had formerly 
been felt by the English statesmen for America as 
a whole. 

It is well indeed for our land that we of this 
generation have at last learned to think nationally, 
and, no matter in what State we live, to view our 
whole country with the pride of personal posses- 
sion. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

THE NORTHERN DISUNION MOVEMENT AMONG 
THE FEDERALISTS. 

IT is a painful thing to have to record that the 
closing act in a great statesman's career not 
only compares ill with what went before, but 
is actually to the last degree a discreditable and 
unworthy performance. 

Morris's bitterness and anger against the gov- 
ernment grew apace; and finally his hatred for 
the administration became such, that, to hurt it, 
he was willing also to do irreparable harm to the 
nation itself. He violently opposed the various 
embargo acts, and all the other governmental 
measures of the decade before the war; and 
worked himself up to such a pitch, when hostili- 
ties began, that, though one of the founders of 
the Constitution, though formerly one of the chief 
exponents of the national idea, and though once 
a main upholder of the Union, he abandoned 
every patriotic principle and became an ardent 
advocate of Northern secession. 

To any reasoning student of American history 
it goes without saying that there was very good 
cause for his anger -with the administration. 
From the time the House of Virginia came into 

325 



326 Gouverneur Morris 

power, until the beginning of Monroe's adminis- 
tration, there was a distinctly anti-New England 
feeling at Washington, and much of the legislation 
bore especially heavily on the Northeast. Ex- 

/' cepting Jefferson, we have never produced an 
executive more helpless than Madison, when it 
came to grappling with real dangers and diffi- 

^^ culties. Like his predecessor, he was only fit to 
( be president in a time of profound peace ; he was 
utterly out of place the instant matters grew 
turbulent, or difficult problems arose to be solved, 
and he was a ridiculously incompetent leader for 
a war with Great Britain. He was entirely too 
timid to have embarked on such a venture of his 
own accord, and was simply forced into it by the 
threat of losing his second term. The fiery young 
Democrats of the South and West, and their 
brothers of the Middle States, were the authors 
of the war; they themselves, for all their bluster, 
were but one shade less incompetent than their 
nominal chief, when it came to actual work, and 
were shamefully unable to make their words good 
by deeds. 

The administration thus drifted into a war 
which it had neither the wisdom to avoid, nor the 
forethought to prepare for. In view of the fact 
that the war was their own, it is impossible to con- 
demn sufficiently strongly the incredible folly of 
the Democrats in having all along refused to build 



The Disunion Movement 327 

a navy or provide any other adequate means of 
defense. In accordance with their curiously foolish "'"^ 
theories, they persisted in relying on that weakest 
of all weak reeds, the militia, who promptly ran 
away every time they faced a foe in the open.y- 
This applied to all, whether eastern, western, or 
southern ; the men of the Northern States in 181 2 
and 1 813 did as badly as, and no worse than, the 
Virginians in 18 14. Indeed, one of the good 
results of the war was that it did away forever 
with all reliance on the old-time militia, the most 
expensive and inefficient species of soldiery that 
could be invented. During the first year the 
monotonous record of humiliations and defeats 
was only relieved by the splendid victories of the 
navy which the Federalists had created twelve 
years previously, and which had been hurt rather 
than benefited in the intervening time. Grad- 
ually, however, the people themselves began to 
bring out leaders: two, Jackson and Scott, were 
really good generals, under whom our soldiers 
became able to face even the English regulars, 
then the most formidable fighting troops in the 
world ; and it must be remembered that Jackson 
won his fights absolutely imhelped by the admin- 
istration. In fact, the government at Washing-"] 
ton does not deserve one shred of credit for any of / 
the victories we won, although to it we directly] 
owe the greater number of our defeats. 



328 Gouverneur Morris 

Granting, however, all that can be said as to the 
hopeless inefficiency of the administration, both 
in making ready for and in waging the war, it yet 
remains true that the war itself was eminently 
justifiable, and was of the greatest service to the 
nation. We had been bulhed by England and 
France -until we had to fight to preserve our na- 
tional self-respect; and we very properly singled 
out our chief aggressor, though it would perhaps 
have been better still to have acted on the proposi- 
tion advanced in Congress, and to have declared 
war on both. Although nominally the peace left 
things as they had been, practically we gained our 
point; and we certainly came out of the contest 
with a greatly increased reputation abroad. In 
spite of the ludicrous series of failures which began 
with our first attempt to invade Canada, and cul- 
minated at Bladensburg, yet in a succession of 
contests on the ocean and the lakes, we shattered 
the charmed shield of British naval invincibility ; 
while on the northern frontier we developed under 
Scott and Brown an infantry which, unlike any of 
the armies of continental Europe, was able to meet 
on equal terms the British infantry in pitched 
battle in the open; and at New Orleans we did 
what the best of Napoleon's marshals, backed by 
the flower of the French soldiers, had been unable 
to accomplish during five years of warfare in 
Spain, and inflicted a defeat such as no EngHsh 



The Disunion Movement 329 

army had suffered during a quarter of a century 
of unbroken warfare. Above all, the contest gave 
an immense impetus to our national feeling, and 
freed our politics forever from any dependence on 
those of a foreign power. 

The war was distinctly worth fighting, and 
resulted in good to the country. The blame that 
attaches to Madison and the elder Democratic- 
Republican leaders, as well as to their younger 
associates. Clay, Calhoim, and the rest, who fairly 
flogged them into action, relates to their utter 
failure to make any preparations for the contest, 
to their helpless inability to carry it on, and to the 
extraordinary weakness and indecision of their 
policy throughout; and on all these points it is 
hardly possible to visit them with too unsparing 
censure. 

Yet, grave though these faults were, they were 
mild compared to those committed by Morris and 
the other ultra-Federalists of New York and New 
England. Morris's opposition to the war led him 
to the most extravagant lengths. In his hatred of 
the opposite party he lost all loyalty to the nation. 
He championed the British view of their right to 
impress seamen from our ships; he approved of 
peace on the terms they offered, which included a 
curtailment of our western frontier, and the erec- 
tion along it of independent Indian sovereignties 
under British protection. He found space in his 



330 Gouverneur Morris 

letters to exult over the defeats of Bonaparte, but 
could spare no word of praise for our own victories. 
He actually advocated repudiating our war debt,' 
on the ground that it was void, being founded on 
a moral wrong ; and he wished the Federalists to 
make public profession of their purpose, so that 
when they should come back to power, the holders 
might have no reason to complain that there had 
been no warning of their intention. To Josiah 
Quincy, on May 15, he wrote: "Should it be 
objected, as it probably will to favor lenders and 
their associates, that public faith is pledged, it 
may be replied that a pledge wickedly given is not 
to be redeemed." He thus advanced the theory 
that in a government ruled by parties, which come 
into power alternately, any debt could be repudi- 
ated, at any time, if the party in power happened 
to disapprove of its originally being incurred. No 
greenback demagogue of the lowest type ever 
advocated a proposition more dishonest or more 
contemptible. 

He wrote that he agreed with Pickering that it 
was impious to raise taxes for so unjust a war. 
He endeavored, fortimately in vain, to induce 
Rufus King in the Senate to advocate the refusal 
of supplies of every sort, whether of men or money, 
for carrying on the war; but King was far too 
honorable to turn traitor. Singularly forgetful of 

*As, for instance, in a letter to David R. Ogden, April 5,1813. 



The Disunion Movement 331 

his speeches in the Senate ten years before, he 
declared that he wished that a foreign power might 
occupy and people the West, so as, by outside 
pressure, to stifle our feuds. He sneered at the 
words union and constitution, as being meaning- 
less. He railed bitterly at the honest and loyal 
majority of his fellow Federalists in New York, 
who had professed their devotion to the Union; 
and in a letter of April 29, to Harrison Gray Otis — 
who was almost as bad as himself — he strongly 
advocated secession, writing among other things 
that he wished the New York Federalists to 
declare publicly that "the Union, being the 
means of freedom, should be prized as such, but 
that the end should not be sacrificed to the 
means." By comparing this with Calhoun's 
famous toast at the Jefferson birthday dinner 
in 1830, "The Union; next to our liberty the 
most dear; may we all remember that it can 
only be preserved by respecting the rights of 
the States and distributing equally the benefit 
and the burden of the Union," it can be seen how 
completely Morris's utterances went on all fours 
with those of the great nullifier. 

To Pickering he wrote, on October 17, 18 14: 
"I hear every day professions of attachment to 
the Union, and declarations as to its importance. 
I should be glad to meet with some one who could 
tell me what has become of the Union, in what it 



332 Gouverneur Morris 

consists, and to what useful purpose it endures.*' 
He regarded the dissolution of the Union to be so 
nearly an accomplished fact that the only ques- 
tion was whether the boundary should be "the 
Delaware, the Susquehanna, or the Potomac;" 
for he thought that New York would have to go 
with New England. He nourished great hopes 
of the Hartford Convention, which he expected 
would formally come out for secession ; he wrote 
Otis that the convention should declare that the 
Union was already broken, and that all that re- 
mained to do was to take action for the preserva- 
tion of the interests of the Northeast. He was 
much chagrined when the convention fell under 
the control of Cabot and the moderates. As late 
as January lo, 1815, he wrote that the only pro- 
ceeding from which the people of his section 
would gain practical benefit would be a "sever- 
ance of the Union." 

In fact, throughout the War of 181 2 he ap- 
peared as the open champion of treason to the 
nation, of dishonesty to the nation's creditors, 
and of cringing subserviency to a foreign power. 
It is as impossible to reconcile his course with his 
previous career and teachings as it is to try to 
make it square with the rules of statesmanship 
and morality. His own conduct affords a con- 
clusive condemnation of his theories as to the 
great inferiority of a government conducted by the 



vJ 



The Disunion Movement 333 

multitude, to a government conducted by the few 
who should have riches and education. Undoubt- 
edly he was one of these few; he was an excep- 
tionally able man, and a wealthy one; but he 
went farther wrong at this period than the major- 
ity of our people — the "mob" as he would have 
contemptuously called them — have ever gone at 
any time; for though every State in turn, and 
almost every statesman, has been wrong upon 
some issue or another, yet in the long nm the 
bulk of the people have always hitherto shown 
themselves true to the cause of right. Morris 
strenuously insisted upon the need of property 
being defended from the masses ; yet he advocated 
repudiation of the national debt, which he should 
have known to be quite as dishonest as the repudi- 
ation of his individual liabilities, and he was cer- 
tainly aware that the step is a short one between 
refusing to pay a man what ought to be his and 
taking away from him what actually is his. 

There were many other Federalist leaders in the 
same position as himself, especially in the three 
southern New England States, where the whole 
Federalist party laid itself open to the gravest 
charges of disloyalty. Morris was not alone in his 
creed at this time. On the contrary, his position 
is interesting because it is typical of that assumed 
by a large section of his party throughout the 
Northeast. In fact, the FederaHsts in this portion 



334 Gouverneur Morris 

of the Union had split in three, although the 
lines of cleavage were not always well marked. 
Many of them remained heartily loyal to the 
national idea; the bulk hesitated as to whether 
they should go all lengths or not; while a large 
and influential minority, headed by Morris, Pick- 
ering, Quincy, Lowell, and others, were avowed 
disunionists. Had peace not come when it did, 
it is probable that the moderates would finally 
have fallen under the control of these ultras. The 
party developed an element of bitter unreason in 
defeat ; it was a really sad sight to see a body of 
able, educated men, interested and skilled in the 
conduct of public affairs, all going angrily and 
stupidly wrong on the one question that was of 
vital concern to the nation. 

It is idle to try to justify the proceedings of the 
Hartford Convention, or of the Massachusetts and 
Connecticut legislatures. The decision to keep the 
New England troops as an independent command 
was of itself sufficient ground for condemnation; 
moreover, it was not warranted by any show of 
superior prowess on the part of the New Eng- 
landers, for a portion of Maine continued in pos- 
session of the British till the close of the war. 
The Hartford resolutions were so framed as to 
justify seceding or not seceding as events turned 
out; a man like Morris could extract comfort 
from them, while it was hoped they would not 






The Disunion Movement 335 

frighten those who were more loyal. The major- 
ity of the people in New England were beyond 
question loyal, exactly as in i860 a majority of 
Southerners were opposed to secession; but the 
disloyal element was active and resolute, and 
hoped to force the remainder into its own way 
of thinking. It failed signally, and was buried 
beneath a load of disgrace; and New England 
was taught thus early and by heart the lesson 
that wrongs must be righted within, and not 
without, the Union. It would have been well 
for her sister section of the South, so loyal in 181 5, 
if forty-five years afterward she had spared her- 
self the necessity of learning the same lesson at 
an infinitely greater cost. 

The truth is that it is nonsense to reproach any 
one section with being especially disloyal to the 
Union. At one time or another almost every 
State has shown strong particularistic leanings; 
Connecticut and Pennsylvania, for example, quite 
as much as Virginia or Kentucky. Fortimately 
the outbursts were never simultaneous in a major- 
ity. It is as impossible to question the fact that 
at one period or another of the past, many of the 
States in each section have been very shaky in 
their allegiance, as it is to doubt that they are now 
all heartily loyal. The secession movement of 
i860 was pushed to extremities, instead of being 
merely planned and threatened, and the revolt 



336 Gouverneur Morris 

was peculiarly abhorrent, because of the intention 
to make slavery the "comer-stone" of the new 
nation, and to reintroduce the slave trade, to the 
certain ultimate ruin of the Southern whites, but 
at least it was entirely free from the meanness of 
being made in the midst of a doubtful struggle 
with a foreign foe. Indeed, in this respect the 
ultra-Federalists of New York and New England 
in 1 814 should be compared with the infamous 
Northern copperheads of the Vallandigham stripe 
rather than with the gallant Confederates who 
risked and lost all in fighting for the cause of their 
choice. Half a century before the "stars and 
bars" waved over Lee's last intrenchments, per- 
f ervid New England patriots were fond of fiaimt- . , ; 
ing "the flag with five stripes," and drinking to |1' 

the health of the — fortunately still-bom — new |; 
nation. Later on, the distmion movement among ■ 

the Northern abolitionists, headed by Garrison, 
was perhaps the most absolutely senseless of all, 
for its success meant the immediate abandonment 
of every hope of abolition. 

In each one of these movements men of the 
highest character and capacity took part. Morris 
had by previous services rendered the whole nation 
his debtor; Garrison was one of the little band 
who, in the midst of general apathy, selfishness, 
and cowardice, dared to demand the cutting out 
of the hideous plague spot of our civilization; 



The Disunion Movement 337 

while Lee and Jackson were as remarkable for 
stainless purity and higli-mindedness as they were 
for their consummate military skill. But the dis- 
union movements in which they severally took 
part were wholly wrong. An Englishman of 
to-day may be equally proud of the valor of Cava- 
lier and Roundhead ; but, if competent to judge, 
he must admit that the Roiindhead was right. So 
it is with us. The man who fought for secession 
warred for a cause as evil and as capable of work- 
ing lasting harm as the doctrine of the divine right 
of kings itself. But we may feel an intense pride 
in his gallantry; and we may believe in his hon- 
esty as heartily as we believe in that of the only 
less foolish being who wishes to see our govern- 
ment strongly centralized, heedless of the self- 
evident fact that over such a vast land as ours the 
nation can exist only as a Federal Union ; and that, 
exactly as the liberty of the individual and the 
rights of the States can only be preserved by up- 
holding the strength of the nation, so this same 
localizing of power in all matters not essentially 
national is vital to the well-being and durability 
of the government. 

Besides the honorable men drawn into such 
movements, there have always been plenty who 
took part in or directed them for their own selfish 
ends, or whose minds were so warped and their 
sense of political morality so crooked as to make 
22 



338 Gouverneur Morris 

them originate schemes that would have reduced 
us to the impotent level of the Spanish-American 
republics. These men were peculiar to neither 
section. In 1803, Aaron Burr of New York was 
undoubtedly anxious to bring about in the North- 
east' what sixty years later Jefferson Davis of 
Mississippi so nearly succeeded in doing in the 
South; and the attempt in the South to make a 
hero of the one is as foolish as it would be to make 
a hero of the other in the North, If there are such 
virtues as loyalty and patriotism, then there must 
exist the corresponding crime of treason ; if there 
is any merit in practising the first, then there must 
be equal demerit in committing the last. Emascu- 
lated sentimentalists may try to strike from the 
national dictionary the word treason; but until 
that is done, Jefferson Davis must be deemed 
guilty thereof, v' 

There are, however, very few of our statesmen 
whose characters can be painted in simple, uni- 
form colors, like Washington and Lincoln on the 
one hand, or Burr and Davis on the other. Nor is 
Morris one of these few. His place is alongside 
of men like Madison, Samuel Adams, and Patrick 
Henry, who did the nation great service at times, 
but each of whom, at some one or two critical junc- 
tures, ranged himself with the forces of disorder. 

1 People sometimes forget that Burr was as willing to try- 
sedition in the East as in the West. 



The Disunion Movement 339 

After the peace Morris accommodated himself 
to the altered condition with his usual buoyant 
cheerfulness ; he was too light-hearted, and, to say 
the truth, had too good an opinion of himself, to 
be cast down even by the signal failure of his 
expectations and the memory of the by no means 
creditable part he had played. Besides, he had 
the great virtue of always good-humoredly yield- 
ing to the inevitable. He heartily wished the 
coimtry well, and kept up a constant correspond- 
ence with men high in influence at Washington. 
He disliked the tariff bill of 18 16; he did not 
believe in duties or imposts, favoring internal, 
although not direct, taxation. He was sharp- 
sighted enough to see that the Federal party had 
shot its bolt and outlived its usefulness, and that 
it was time for it to dissolve. To a number of 
Federalists at Philadelphia, who wished to con- 
tinue the organization, he wrote strongly advising 
them to give up the idea, and adding some very 
sound and patriotic coimsel. " Let us forget 
party and think of our coimtry. That country 
embraces both parties. We must endeavor, 
therefore, to save and benefit both. This cannot 
be effected while political delusions array good 
men against each other. If you abandon the con- 
test, the voice of reason, now drowned in factious 
vociferation, will be listened to and heard. The 
pressure of distress will accelerate the moment of 



340 Gouverneur Morris 

reflection ; and when it arrives the people will look 
out for men of sense, experience, and integrity. 
Such men may, I trust, be found in both parties ; 
and if otir country be delivered, what does it sig- 
nify whether those who operate her salvation wear 
a Federal or Democratic cloak?" These words 
formed almost his last public utterance, for they 
were penned but a couple of months before his 
death ; and he might well be content to let them 
stand as a fit closing to his public career. 

He died November 6, 1816, when sixty-four 
years old, after a short illness. He had siiffered 
at intervals for a long time from gout ; but he had 
enjoyed general good health, as his erect, com- 
manding, well-built figure showed; for he was a 
tall and handsome man. He was buried on his 
own estate at Morrisania. 

There has never been an American statesman of 
keener intellect or more brilliant genius. Had he 
possessed but a little more steadiness and self- 
control he would have stood among the two or 
three very foremost. He was gallant and fearless. 
He was absolutely upright and truthful ; the least 
suggestion of falsehood was abhorrent to him. 
His extreme, aggressive frankness, joined to a 
certain imperiousness of disposition, made it dif(i. 
cult for him to get along well with many of the 
men with whom he was thrown in contact. In 
politics he was too much of a free lance ever to 



The Disunion Movement 341 

stand very high as a leader. He was very gener- 
ous and hospitable ; he was witty and humorous, 
a charming companion, and extremely fond of 
good living. He had a proud, almost hasty tem- 
per, and was quick to resent an insult. He was 
strictly just ; and he made open war on all traits 
that displeased him, especially meanness and 
hypocrisy. He was essentially a strong man, and 
he was an American through and through. 

Perhaps his greatest interest for us lies in the 
fact that he was a shrewder, more far-seeing ob- 
server and recorder of contemporary men and 
events, both at home and abroad, than any other 
American or foreign statesman of his time. But 
aside from this he did much lasting work. He 
took a most prominent part in bringing about the 
independence of the colonies, and afterward in 
welding them into a single powerful nation, whose 
greatness he both foresaw and foretold. He made 
the final draft of the United States Constitution ; 
he first outlined our present system of national 
coinage; he originated and got under way the 
plan for the Erie Canal; as minister to France 
he successfully performed the most difficult task 
ever allotted to an American representative at a 
foreign capital. With all his faults, there are 
few men of his generation to whom the country 
owes more than to Gouvemeur Morris. 



INDEX 



Adams, John, 49; appointed 
commissioner, 113; repu- 
diates command of Con- 
gress, 114; share in most 
important treaty, 117; ab- 
sent from National Con- 
vention, 126; nominated 
for the Presidency, 308; 
signs judiciary bill, 311; 
appoints new judges, 311 

Adams, Samuel, 72, 75, 121 

Allen, Ethan, 42 

America, successful, 1 1 1 , 112, 
123, 124, 135 

American army, suffering of, 
72, 73; commissioners, 113, 
114, 115, 117; Constitu- 
tional Convention, dele- 
gates in, 125; contrasted 
with States General of 
France, 126, 127, 128; inde- 
pendence, 115, 116; leaders 
compared with European, 
78, 79; nav'y, 184, 273; 
triumph, 116, 117 

Americans, in Revolutionary 
War, 5; of 1776, compared 
with those of Civil War, 46 

Ames, Fisher, 307 

Assembly, 31, 34, 35, 41 

Bank of North America, 98 

Bastile, the, 198, 212 

Battle of Bennington, 65; 
Brandywine, 70; Prince- 
ton, 45; Trenton, 45, 46; 
Guilford Court House, 107 

Battles on soil of New York, 
3.4 



British allies, 46, 47, 64, 113; 

warships, 40, 43 
Brunswick, Duke of, 266, 267 
Burgoyne, 46, 64, 68, 70, 73; 

breach of faith with, 118 
Burke, Edmund, 36 
Burr, Aaron, 30S, 309, 338; 

and Jefferson Davis, 338 
Butler, 139, 147 

Calhoun, famous toast of , 331 
Canada, 42, 84, 85 
Carolinas, the, 8, 11, 28, 42, 

47 

Carroll, 37 

Church of Rome, 61 

Churches, 9, 13, 16, 17, 18 

Civil War, people in the, 46 

Clermont-Tonnerre, Count de, 
168, 191 

Clinton, George, 10; chosen 
governor, 64, 306; as a 
politician, 91, 121 

Clintons, the, 10, 19, 64 

Colonial contests, 3; legisla- 
ture, 19, 20, 30 

Colonies, 10 

Confederation, condition of, 
after the war, 119 

Congress. See Continental; 
see Provincial. 

Connecticut, 42, 43 

Constitution, its character, 
128, 133, 134; opposition to 
its adoption, 155, 157 

Continental Congress, the, 
34; dishonorable acts, 69, 
74, 75, 76; its condition at 
end of 1779, 94; estab- 



343 



344 



Index 



lishes four departments, 
98; instructions to com- 
missioners, 113, 114 

Convention, New York, 55, 
61; national, 1 2 5-1 3 1 

Cornwallis, 108, no 

Council of appointment, 60, 
146; of revisions, 60, 146; 
of safety, 64, 67 

Cruger, 13, 42 

Currency, condition of, 99; 
table proposed, loi 

Dairy mple. General, 118 

Danton, 252, 269, 277 

Davis, Jefferson, 338 

D'Artois, Count (Charles X.), 
204, 287 

Deane, Silas, 88 

Decimal system, 98, 102 

Declaration of Independence, 
44, 50; of Rights, 167 

De Lancys, 16, 20, 42 

D'Estaing, Count, 247 

De Flahaut, Madame, 191- 
194 

Democracy, 137 

Democrats, 129, 130 

Departments, 97 

De Stael, 190; Madame, 168, 
187; vanity of, 188, 189; 
want of delicacy, 190; her 
estimate of the Abb6 Sie- 
yes, 231; grief for Lafay- 
ette, 297 

Disunion movements, 335, 

33^. 337 ^ 
Dollar, the Spanish, 100, loi 

Dumouriez, 251-254 

Dutch, descendants of, 8; 
language, 12; republicans, 
16; battle with English, 
109; in war with Spain, 
124 

Ellsworth, Oliver, 151 
England, treatment of her 



American subjects, 4, 5; 

grounds of complaint, 5; 

courage, no; insolence, 302 
English, stock, people of, 5, 

118; language, 11, 12; 

historians, in; hostile 

feeling, 214, 215; society, 

216, 217; climate, 321 
Episcopalians, 13, 16, 18, 20, 

57 
Esterhazy, 292, 293 

Extremists, 19 

Federalism, 130, 302, 303 
Federalist party, leaders of, 

87, 129, 130 
Federalists, 133, 147, 301, 

303- 310. 313. 314 . 

Foreign or non-English ele- 
ments, 10, II, 12, 31 

Foreigners, movement 
against, 147 

Fox, 117, 218, 221 

France, treaty with, 83; 
would have Americans de- 
pendent allies, 115, 116; 
117; contrasted with 
America, 173; destitute of 
statesmen, 226 

Franklin, appointed commis- 
sioner, 113, 114, 117; dele- 
gate to National Conven- 
tion, 125; advocate of 
weak central government, 
129 

French, motives, 84, 85; 
struggles with England, 
109; navy, no; admirals, 
in; government, 115; 
character, 174-177; no- 
blesse and common people, 
199; Revolution, 160-165, 
229, 241-247 

Gates, 67, 68, 69, 70 
Generals, of Revolution, 48, 
no; in Civil War, 49 



Index 



345 



Genet, 274 

George III., 7, 214, 217 
Georgia, 8, 11, 47. 151 
Gerard, 84, 85, 116 
German auxiliaries, 113 
Germany, 136, 155 
Gibraltar, 109, no, 115 
Government, 122, 123, 135, 

136 
Governor, name obnoxious, 

59 
Gower, Lord, 259 

Great Britain and American 
subjects, 4, 6 ; odds against, 
109; hostility to American 
trade, 120 

Greene, 42, 49, 81, 107, 109, 
no, III 

Hamilton, Alexander, 10, 48, 
87.97.99, 105; delegate to 
National Convention, 125; 
advocate of strong govern- 
ment, 129, 130; in favor of 
domestic manufactures, 
147; proposes basis of 
representation, 149; as- 
sisted in writing the " Fed- 
eralist," 156; procures rat- 
ification of the Constitu- 
tion, 157; passing coolness 
with Morris, 301; his 
haughtiness, 306; defeat 
by Democrats, 308 

Hancock, John, 75 

Hartford Convention, 334 

Henry, Patrick, 121, 304 

Herkomer, 10 

Holland, 1 10 

Huguenots, 9, 61 

Impressment of American 

sailors, 219, 220 
Independence, 51, 52, 83 
India, 109, no 
Indian warfare, 3, 4, 70 
Infidels, 270 



Irish, in New England, 11; 
of 1776, 20; in Revolu- 
tionary armies, 32 

Jackson, General 327 

Jay, John, admitted to the 
bar, 22; in Continental 
Congress, 38, 39; resolu- 
tion endorsing Declaration 
of Independence, 55; plan 
for state constitution, 58, 
59; article on toleration, 
61 ; would abolish slavery, 
63, 64; on committee to 
organize state government, 
67; defends Schttyler's 
cause, 68; reinforcements 
for Gates, 69 ; chief justice, 
7 1 ; wishes well to Old 
England, 87; of Puritanic 
morality, 104; friendship 
with Morris, 105; minister 
to Spain, no; views on 
education of children, 105; 
affection for America, 106; 
commissioner, 113; repu- 
diates command of Con- 
gress, 114; true policy 
summed up, 116; his, the 
chief part in treaty, 117; 
secretary for foreign af- 
fairs, 126; helps Hamilton 
on the "Federalist," 156; 
a strong Federalist, 282, 
306; appointed to nego- 
tiate treaty in England, 
282, 283, 306; governor, 
306,307,309; visits to and 
from Morris, 319 

Jefferson, 48, 98, 102, 103, 
121, 124, 126; important 
truth taught by him, 130; 
American minister to 
France, 165, 166; treat- 
ment of Morris, 273 ; incom- 
petence when President, 
313. 314, 326 



346 



Index 



Johnsons, the, i6, 36, 42 
Judiciary bill, 31 1-3 13 

King, Rufus, 236, 237 
King's College, 3, 17 

Lafayette, 81, no, 165, 166, 
167, 170, 173, 176; his 
character, 208, 209, 255; 
ideas impracticable, 225, 
226; proclaimed and im- 
prisoned, 255, 256; re- 
leased, 296 

Lafayette, Madame de, 170, 

257 

Lake Champlain, 3, 65 

Lake George, 3 

Leaders, 49; loyalist, 16, 42; 
revolutionary, 15, 46 

Lecky, in, 112 

Leeds, Duke of, 217, 219, 222 

Lincoln, 42, 125, 130 

Lineage, 9, 31 

Livingston, Robert, 9, 56; on 
committee to organize state 
government, 63; chancel- 
lor, 7 1 ; secretary of for- 
eign affairs, 97 

Livingstons, the, 20, 306 

Louis XVI., 203, 235, 238, 
239, 268 

Louis XVIII., 288 

Louis Philippe, 297, 298 

Louisiana, 315, 316, 317 

Loyalists, 16, 27, 42, 113, 

157 
Luzerne, 222 

Madison, 121; delegate to 
National Convention, 125; 
during formation of Con- 
stitution, 131, 132, 141, 
144, 152; compliment to 
Morris, 156; assists Ham- 
ilton in writing the "Fed- 
eralist," 156; as President, 
326 



Manorial families, 13, 14, 18 

Marie Antoinette, 211, 270 

Marmontel, 231 

Marshall, 304, 305 

Mason, George, 150 

Merchants, 14, 18, 20 

MiHtia, 65, 66, 68, 107, 108 

Mirabeau, 128, 164, 188, 208, 
209 

Mississippi, 85, 86, 90, 106, 
107, 140 

Money, 22, 34, 120 

Monroe, 275; recalled and re- 
buked, 281 ; a foolish min- 
ister, 282, 283 

Montmorin, Count de, 205, 

234 

Moreau, General, 320 

Morris, Gouvemeur, birth, i ; 
descent, 2; boyhood, 2, 3; 
college career, 19, 21 ; takes 
part in public affairs, 22, 
23 ; desire for foreign travel, 
23; narrow means, 24; in 
society, 25; little faith in 
extreme democracy, 28, 29; 
dislike for mobs, 29, ^o; 
plans for reunion with 
Great Britain, 30, 31 ; dele- 
gate to Provincial Con- 
gress, 32, 33; report and 
speech, 35, 36; objects to 
eighth article of report, 38; 
at head of patriotic party, 
43, 44, 50; able speech in 
favor of new governments, 
50-55; member of commit- 
tees, 56 ; position in regard 
to the Tories, 56, 57; for- 
mation of State Constitu- 
tion, 58, 63; at Schuyler's 
headquarters, 64, 67; ef- 
forts in behalf of Schuyler, 
68; secures reinforcements 
for Gates, 69; letters to 
Schuyler, 70, 71; elected 
to Continental Congress, 



Index 



347 



72; visits Valley Forge, 72; 
a good financier, 73, 76, 81 ; 
endeavors to secure ap- 
proval of Washington's 
plans, 74, 75, 78, 80; letter 
to Washington, 79; friend- 
ship with Greene, 81; re- 
port on Lord North's con- 
ciliatory bills, 83; prepares 
"Observations on the 
American Revolution," 83; 
drafts instructions to 
Franklin, 84; reply to 
French minister, 86 ; " Ob- 
servations on the Finances 
of America," 86; his loyal- 
ist relatives, 87; contro- 
versy with Thomas Paine, 
88; drafts instructions to 
our foreign ministers, 89, 
90; dispute of New York 
with Vermont, 90, 91 ; fails 
of reelection, 92; life in 
Philadelphia, 94; pub- 
lishes essays on the finan- 
ces, 95, 96, 97; assistant 
financier, 97; founder of 
national coinage, 98, 99, 
10 1, 102; enjoyment in 
society, 103, 104; serious 
injury, 103; want of in- 
sight into the future, 107; 
foresees final success of 
Greene, 107; letters to Jay, 
112, 113, 119; advocates a 
firmer Union, 121, 122; in 
Constitutional Convention, 
126, 131, 132; has no re- 
gard for States-rights, 133- 
137; jealousy of the West, 
137.138; views on the suf- 
frage, 140-144; on the 
power of the President, 144, 
145; on the judiciary, 146; 
on Congress, 146; speeches 
on the slavery question, 
148,150; a warm advocate 



of the Constitution, 156; 
return to New York, 157; 
acts in behalf of loyalists, 
157; residence in France, 
159; letters and diary, 160, 
165, 166, 172; hostile to 
spirit of French Revolu- 
tion, 160-165; at home in 
Parisian society, 165; opin- 
ion of Jefferson, 166; of La- 
fayette, 167, 171 ; views on 
French politics, 172-175; 
distrust of French charac- 
ter, 174, 175, 177, 178; 
National Assembly, 178, 
179; a true republican and 
American, 181, 182; minor 
services toWashington ,183; 
correspondence with Paul 
Jones, 184; life in Paris, 
185, 186, 187; opinion of 
Madame de Stael, 1 87-191; 
intimacy with Madame de 
Flahaut,i9i-i94; acquaint- 
ance with the Duchess of 
Orleans, 194-198, 230, 231; 
literary life of the sal6n, 
199, 201; judgment of his 
contemporaries, 202, 205, 
210; of French people,2 10; 
advice to a certain painter, 
212; mission to British 
government, 213, 214; 
English not congenial, 215, 



216 
218 
219 



impatience at delay, 
interview with Pitt, 
is blamed for failure 
of negotiations, 221; trip 
through Netherlands and 
up the Rhine, 222; specu- 
lations of various kinds, 
223, 224; advice to Lafay- 
ette, 225, 228, 243; letter 
to Washington, 228-230; 
fondness for the theater, 
232; dislike to priesthood, 
233; interest in home af- 



348 



Index 



fairs, 235; made minister 
to France, 236; is advised 
by Washington, 236, 237; 
plans for escape of the king 
and queen, 238, 239, 240; 
his, a brilhant chapter in 
American diplomacy, 240, 
241; horror of the mob, 
243, 244; house a place of 
refuge, 246, 247; picture 
of the French, 248-251; 
generosity to Lafayette 
family, 257, remains in 
Paris, 2 58,260; spiritedcon- 
duct when harassed, 260, 
261 ; payment of American 
debt, 262, 263; irritates 
the executive council, 263, 
264; French privateers, 
265 ; commentary on pass- 
ing events, 265-273; is re- 
called, 274 ; as foreign min- 
ister to be honored, 247, 
276; accurate forecast of 
events, 276; clear views of 
French Revolution, 279; 
journeys in Europe, 283; 
no longer an impartial 
judge, 284; estimate of 
Napoleon, 284; in Switzer- 
land, 285 ; in Great Britain, 
285; opinion of royalist 
refugees, 287, 288; in Ber- 
lin, 288, 295; in Vienna, 
291-295; dealings with 
Louis Philippe, 297, 298; 
return to New York, 300; 
elected to Senate ,307; dis- 
approves of Burr, 309; 
opinion of Jefferson, 310; 
speech in favor of occupy- 
ing Louisiana, 316; fails of 
reelection, 318; leader in 
project of Erie Canal, 318; 
life at Morrisania, 319; 
marriage, 319; formality, 
319; compares America 



and England, 320, 321; 
loses his satisfaction with 
the people and the govern- 
ment, and becomes soured, 
323,324; advocates north- 
ern secession, 325; loses his 
loyalty to the nation, 330— 
336; closing acts of his 
career unworthy of him, 
330-333; after the peace, 
339; gives sound and pat- 
riotic counsel, 339, 340; 
death, 340; character and 
services, 340 
Morris, Robert, 97, 125 
Morris, Staats Long, 14, 57, 

157 . 
Morrisania, i, 157, 318 

Morrises, the, 2 

Narbonne, Chevalier de, 189, 
190 

National Union, 119, 132 

Nationalists, 133 

Necker, 187, 188, 205, 206, 
207 

New England, 11, 151, 203; 
Puritans, 5; militia, 65; 
members of Continental 
Congress, 67, 75, 76 

New Rochelle, 3 

New York city, I ; society in, 
25; exposed positions, 40; 
entered by Continental 
forces, 43; left by peace- 
able citizens, 44; held by 
British, 1 10 

New York colony, 1,3; bat- 
tles in, 3, 4; claim of lib- 
erty as a right, 6; loyalty, 
6, 7 ; many nationalities, 8, 
9; churches, 9; ethnic 
type, 10; rivalries, 13; 
government, 13; three 
parties, 18; in debt, 22; 
not in full sympathy with 
the patriots, 23'> soldiers 



Index 



349 



in royal armies, 41 ; famous 
Tory leaders, 42 ; second 
Provincial Congress, 43 ; 
third Provincial Congress, 
44; Declaration of Inde- 
pendence ratified, and 
State Constitution organ- 
ized, 44; adoption of the 
national Constitution, 155, 

157 
New York State, 45; party 

contests, 305 
New Yorkers, 12, 30, 91 
North Carolina, 155 
North, Lord, conciliatory bills 

of, 82 

Officers, in trade, 76 ; foreign, 

80 
Oriskany, fight at, 10, 66, 68 
Orleans, Duchess of, 194,195, 

196, 230, 231 
Orleans, Duke of (Egalit6), 

194, 258, 270 
Otis, Harrison Gray, 331 

Paine, Thomas, 88, 270, 271 
Paris, 249, 250; factions in, 

252; changed, 253 
Paul Jones, 184 
Pennsylvania, 148, 156, 303 
Philadelphia, 104 
Pinckney, 137. 305. 308 
Pitt, 218, 219, 220, 222 
Presbyterians, 13, 17, 20 
Prisoners, exchange of, iiS 
Provincial Congress, 31, 32, 

35. 36, 40, 42, 43. 50, 5.5 
Proviso regarding toleration, 

62 
Prussia, 288, 289 

Quebec, 10; bill, 38 
Queen's County, 41, 43 

Randolph, 274 



Representation of slave 

States, 148, 149, 154 
Republican party, 133 
Republicanism, extreme, 19 
Revolution,, enemies in, 46, 
64, 65; two sides of, 28; 
officers of, 75; men of, 77, 
78; influence of, compared 
with that of French, 279, 
2S0 
Revolutionary armies com- 
pared with those in Civil 
War, 47, 48, 76, 77 
Rhode Island, 119, 155, 178 
Riedesel, "America," 289; 

General, 296 
Rodney, no, iii 
Rohan, Cardinal de, 233 
Roman Catholics, 9, 37, 61, 

62 
Royalist party, 18, 19 
Rumford, Count, 296 
Russia, 158 

Schuyler, Philip, 9, 64, 65, 
67; replaced by Gates, 67, 
68, 69; his noble behavior, 

70 ^ 

Scott, General, 327 
Sherman, Roger, 67 
Sieyes, the Abb6, 128, 231 
Six Nations, 3 
Slavery, question of, 63, 148, 

155 
Sons of Liberty, 28, 40 
South Carolina, 70, 137, 151, 

305 
Southern States, 109, 139, 

140, 149, 151, 152, 153 
Spain, 85, 86, 106, 109, 114, 

117, 140 
Spanish-Americans, 123, 124 
St. Clair, General, 69 
St. Patrick's Day, 20 
Stamp Act, 4 
Stark, 65 
States General, 126, 173, 210 



35° 



Index 



Statesmen, 48, 126 
SuflErage not an inborn or 
natural right, 140, 141, 147 

Taine, 172 

Talleyrand, 191, 207, 232,259 
Tarleton, Colonel, 232 
Tess6, Comtesse de, 171 
Toleration, 36, 61, 62, 63 
Tories, SS' 4i, 47. 5<5, 57. 64, 

rr. ^7. 157 

Tory leaders, 42 
Treaty, 117; obligations of, 
unfulfilled, 213 ; Jay's, 307 
Trio, great American, 125 
Try on, royal governor, 41 

Valley Forge, 46, 72 

Vergennes, 115, 222 

Vermont, 66, 90-92 

Virginia, 108, 150, 151, 155; 
her statesmen and war- 
riors. 304 

War of 1812, 140, 327 
Warriors, 48, 49, 304 



Washington, 31, 41, 43-45; 
statesman, soldier, patriot, 
48; difficulties, 74, 75; 
confidence in Morris, 78; 
dislike to foreign officers, 
80; letter to Jay, 112; 
delegate in National Con- 
vention, 125; letter to 
Morris, 178; views with 
regard to French Revolu- 
tion, 179, 180, 236, 273, 
274; a watch for, 183, 184; 
statue by Houdon, 184; 
kind advice, 236, 237; re- 
calls Monroe, 281 ; reply to 
letter of Morris, 287; dis- 
trust of Jefferson and Mad- 
ison, 301 

West, the, 137, 138, 139 

Whig families, 19, 20 

White Plains, 50 

Wisdom of many worth more 
than wisdom of one, 128, 
129 

Yorktown, 72, no 



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